


The Fellowship of The Ward

by blubberpatchcumquat (VanillaSkyce)



Series: The Gemstone Chronicles [3]
Category: Original Work, Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Magic, Gen, Greg Actually Does Stuff In This AU, Minor Character Death, Original Fiction, Pearl is Steven's Aunt, Relationships are Platonic (For Now)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-04
Updated: 2019-06-11
Packaged: 2019-09-07 02:44:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 19
Words: 61,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16845598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VanillaSkyce/pseuds/blubberpatchcumquat
Summary: Connie, an Imperial Princess of Shwar, is confused. Everyone knows the tales of the Grey Ward protecting the West from the Evil God Black Diamond are just silly legends. But here she is, forced to join a dangerous quest to recover that very same Ward. No one believes in sorcery, but Steven's aunt and grandfather seem to be the fabled sorcerers Polina and Gregarion, who would have to be thousands of years old.Even young Steven is learning to do sorcery. He's just a farm boy, totally unsuitable for an Imperial Princess. Yet for some reason, she has the urge to teach him, brush back his tangled hair, and comfort him. But he is going to a strange tower in the center of all he believes evil, to face some horrible, powerful magician, and she can't be there to watch over him. She may never see him again!(In this Fantasy Alternate Universe, experience a reimagined version of your favourite characters as they embark on an epic quest to recover the only artifact in the world capable of stopping the Mad God Black Diamond)





	1. Prologue : What Time Forgot

_ Excerpt of an Account of how Phenom sought a God for his People and of how he found DIO upon the sacred Mountain of Diophe  _ __   
_ -based upon The Book of Phenaidia and other fragments _ __   
__   
__   
**AT THE BEGINNING OF DAYS** , the world was spun out of darkness by the seven celestial Diamonds, and they also created beasts and fowls, serpents and fishes, then gems, and shortly after, came men.

  
Now there dwelt in the heavens an elder spirit known as DIO who did not join in this creation. And because he withheld his power and wisdom, much that was made was marred and imperfect. Many creatures were unseemly and strange. These the younger Diamonds sought to unmake, so that all upon the world might be fair.   
  
But DIO stretched forth his hand and prevented them, saying: "What you have wrought you may not unmake. You have torn asunder the fabric and peace of the heavens to bring forth this world as a plaything and an entertainment. Know, however, that whatsoever you make, be it ever so monstrous, shall abide as a rebuke for your folly. In the day that one thing which you have made is unmade, all shall be unmade."   
  
The younger Diamonds were angered. To each monstrous or unseemly thing they had made they said: "Go thou unto DIO and let him be thy God." Then from the races of gems and men, each Diamond chose that people which pleased her. And when there were yet peoples who had no God, the younger Diamonds drove  **_them_ ** forth and said: "Go unto DIO, and  **_he_ ** shall be your God." 

But DIO did not speak.   
  
For long and bitter generations, the Godless Ones wandered and cried out unheard in the wastelands and wilderness of the West.   
  
Then there appeared among their numbers a just and righteous man named Phenom. He gathered the multitudes before him and spoke to them: "We wither and fall as the leaves from the rigors of our wanderings. Our children and our old men die. Better it is that only one shall die. Therefore, stay here and rest upon this plain. I will search for the God named DIO so that we may worship him and have a place in this world."   
  
For twenty long years, Phenom sought DIO, but in vain. Yet the years passed, his hair turned gray, and he wearied of his search. 

In despair, he went up onto a high mountain and cried in a great voice to the sky: "No more! I will search no longer. The Gods are a mockery and deception, and the world is a barren void. There is no DIO, and I am sick of the curse and affliction of my life."   
  
The Spirit of DIO heard and replied: "Why art thou wroth with me, Phenom? Thy making and thy casting out were none of  **_my_ ** doing."   
  
Phenom was afraid and fell upon his face. And DIO spoke again, saying:   
  
"Rise, Phenom, for I am not thy God."   
  
Phenom did not rise. "O my God," he cried, "hide not thy face from thy people who are sorely afflicted because they are outcast and have no God to protect them."   
  
"Rise, Phenom," DIO repeated, "and leave this place. Cease thine lament. Seek thou a God elsewhere and leave me in peace."   
  
Still Phenom did not rise. "O my God," he said, "I wilt still abide. Thy people hunger and thirst. They seek thy blessing and a place where they may dwell."   
  
"Thy speech wearies me," DIO said and he departed.   
  
Phenom dwelt on the mountain thus, and the beasts of the field and fowls of the air brought him sustenance. 

For more than a year he remained. Then the monstrous and unseemly things which the Diamonds had made and abandoned came and sat at his feet, watching him.   
  
The Spirit of DIO was troubled. At last he appeared to Phenom. "Abidest thou still?"   
  
Phenom fell on his face and said: "O my God, thy people cry unto thee in their affliction."   
  
The Spirit of DIO fled again. But Phenom abode there for another year. Dragons brought him meat, and unicorns gave him water. And again DIO came to him, asking: "Abidest thou still?"   
  
Phenom fell on his face. "O my God," he cried, "thy people perish in the absence of thy care." And DIO fled from the righteous man. Another year passed while nameless, unseen things brought him food and drink. 

 

And at long last the Spirit of DIO came to the high mountain and ordered: "Rise, Phenom."   
  
From his prostrate position, Phenom pleaded: "O my God, have mercy."   
  
"Rise, Phenom," DIO replied. He reached down and lifted Phenom up with his hands. "I am DIO - thy God. I command thee to rise and stand before me."   
  
"Then wilt thou be my God?" Phenom asked. "And God unto my people?"   
  
"Indeed, I am thy God and the God of thy people also," DIO said.   
  
Phenom looked down from his high place and beheld the unseemly creatures which had cared for him in his ordeal. "What of these, O my God? Wilt thou be God unto the basilisk and the minotaur, the Dragon and the chimera, the unicorn and the thing unnamed, the winged serpent and the thing unseen? For these are also outcast. Yet there is beauty in each. Turn not your face from them, O my God, for in them is great worthiness. They were sent to thee by the younger Gods. Who will be their God if you refuse them?"   
  
"It was done in my despite," DIO said. "These creatures were sent unto me to bring shame upon me that I had rebuked the younger Gods. I will in no respect be God unto monsters."   
  
The creatures at Phenom’s feet moaned in despair. So Phenom seated himself upon the earth once more and said: "Yet will I abide, O my God."   
  
"Abide if it please thee," DIO said and departed.   
  
It was even as before. Phenom abode, the creatures sustained him, and DIO was troubled. 

 

And before the purity of Phenom’s heart, even the Great God DIO repented and came again. "Rise, Phenom, and serve thy God." DIO reached down and lifted Phenom. "Bring unto me the creatures who sit before thee and I will consider them. If each hath beauty and worthiness, as thou sayest, then I will consent to be their God also."   
  
Then Phenom brought the creatures before DIO. The creatures prostrated themselves before the God and moaned to beseech his blessing. DIO marveled that he had not seen the beauty of each creature before. He raised up his hands and blessed them, saying: "I am DIO and I find beauty and worthiness in each of you. I will be your God, and you shall prosper, and peace shall be among you."   
  
Phenom was glad of heart and he named the high place where all had come to pass Diophe, which means "Divine Place." Then he departed and returned to the plain to bring his people unto their God. 

  
But they did not know him, for when the hands of DIO had touched him all colour fled his form, leaving his body and hair as white as new snow. The people feared him and drove him away with stones.   
  
Discoloured, Phenom cried unto DIO: "O my God, thy touch has changed me, and my people know me not."   
  
DIO raised his hand, and the people were made colourless like Phenom. The Spirit of DIO spoke to them in a great voice: "Hearken unto the words of your God. This is he whom you call Phenom, and he has prevailed upon me to accept you as my people, to watch over you, provide for you, and be God over you. Henceforth shall you be called Phenai-Dia in remembrance of me and in token of his holiness. You shall do as he commands and go where he leads. Any who fail to obey him or follow him will I cut off to wither and perish and be no more."   
  
And so, Phenom commanded the people to take up their goods and their cattle and follow him to the mountains. But the elders of the people did not believe him, nor that the voice had been the voice of DIO. They spoke to Phenom in despite, saying: "If you are the servant of the God DIO, perform a wonder in proof of it."   
  
Phenom answered: "Behold your skin and hair. Is that not wonder enough for you?"   
  
They were troubled and went away. But they came to him again, saying: "The mark upon us is because of a pestilence which you brought from some unclean place and no proof of the favor of DIO."   
  
Phenom raised his hands, and the creatures which had sustained him came to him like lambs to a shepherd. The elders were afraid and went away for a time. But soon they came again, saying: "The creatures are monstrous and unseemly. You are a demon sent to lure the people to destruction, not a servant of the Great God DIO. We have still seen no proof of the favor of DIO."   
  
Now Phenom grew weary of them. He cried in a great voice: "I say to the people that they have heard the voice of DIO. I have suffered much in your behalf. Now I return to Diophe, the holy place. Let him who would follow me do so; let him who would not remain." He turned and went toward the mountains.   
  
Some few people went with him, but the greater part of the people remained, and they reviled Phenom and those who followed him: "Where is this wonder which proves the favor of DIO? We do not follow or obey Phenom, yet neither do we wither and perish."   
  
Then Phenom looked upon the remains of his former people in great sadness and spoke to them for the last time: "You have besought a wonder from me. Then behold this wonder. Even as the voice of DIO said, you are withered like the limb of a tree that is cut off. Truly, this day you have perished." And he led the few who followed him into the mountains and to Diophe.   
  
The multitude of the people mocked him and returned to their tents to laugh at the folly of those who followed him. For a year they laughed and mocked. Then they laughed no more, for their women were barren and bore no children. The people withered and in time they perished and were no more.   
  
The people who followed Phenom came with him to Diophe. There they built a city. The Spirit of DIO was with them, and they dwelt in peace with the creatures who had sustained Phenom. Phenom lived for many lifetimes; and after him, each High Priest of DIO was named Phenom and lived to a great age. For a thousand years, the peace of DIO was with them, and they believed it would last forever.   
  
But the Mad God Black Diamond stole the Ward that was made by Grey Diamond, and the war of men and Gods began. Black used the Ward to break the earth asunder and let in the sea, and the Ward burned her horribly. And she fled into Noxus.   
  
The earth was maddened by her wounding, and the creatures which had dwelt in peace with the people of Phenaidia were also maddened by that wounding. They rose against the fellowship of DIO and cast down the cities and slew the people, until few remained.   
  
Those who escaped fled to Diophe, where the creatures dared not follow for fear of the wrath of DIO. Loud were the cries and lamentations of the people. DIO was troubled and he revealed to them the caves that lay under Diophe. The people went down into the sacred caves of DIO and dwelt there.   
  
In time, Gregarion the Sorcerer led the king of the Sangrians and his sons into Noxus to steal back the Ward. When Black sought to pursue, the wrath of the Ward drove her back. Gregarion gave the Ward to the first Hroden King, saying that so long as one of his descendants held the Ward, the West would be safe.   
  
Now the Sangrians scattered and pushed southward into new lands. And the peoples of other Gods were troubled by the war of Gods and men and fled to seize other lands which they called by strange names. But the people of DIO held fast to the caverns of Diophe and had no dealings with them. DIO protected and sustained them and hid them, and the strangers did not know that the people were there. For century after century, the people of Phenaidia took no note of the outer world, even when that world was rocked by the assassination of the last Hroden King and his family.   
  
But when Black Diamond came ravening into the West, leading a mighty army through the lands of the children of DIO, the Spirit of DIO spoke with the Phenom. And the Phenom led forth his people in stealth by night. They fell upon the sleeping army and wreaked mighty havoc. Thus the army of Black Diamond was weakened and fell in defeat before the armies of the West at a place called I'chir Gelar.   
  
Then the Phenom girded himself and went forth to hold council with the victors. And he brought back word that Black Diamond had been gravely wounded. Though the evil God's body was stolen away and hidden by her disciple Andarion, it was said that Black would lie bound in a sleep like death itself until a descendant of the Hroden line should again sit upon the throne at Hrodenheim - which meant never, since it was known that no descendants of that line lived.   
  
Shocking as the visit of the Phenaidians to the outer world had been, no harm seemed to come of it. The children of DIO still prospered under the care of their God and life went on almost as before. It was noticed that the Phenom seemed to spend less time studying The Book of Phenaidia and more searching through moldy old scrolls of prophecy. But a certain oddity might be expected of one who had gone forth from the caverns of Diophe into the world of other peoples.   
  
Then a strange old man appeared before the entrance to the caverns, demanding to speak with the Phenom. And such was the power of his voice that the Phenom was summoned. Then, for the first time since the people had sought safety in the caverns, one who was not of the people of DIO was admitted. The Phenom took the stranger into his chambers and remained closeted with him for days. And thereafter, the strange man with the white beard and tattered clothing appeared at long intervals and was welcomed by the Phenom.   
  
It was even reported once by a young boy that there was a great gray wolf with the Phenom. But that was probably only some dream brought on by sickness, though the boy refused to recant.   
  
The people adjusted and accepted the strangeness of their Phenom. And the years passed, and the people gave thanks to their God, knowing that they were the chosen people of the Great God DIO.


	2. Plots of a Princess

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Connie desperately tries to come to terms with the situation presented before her.

**HER IMPERIAL HIGHNESS, PRINCESS CONNIE** , jewel of the House of Maheshwar and the loveliest flower of the Shwarean Empire, sat cross-legged on a sea chest in the oak-beamed cabin beneath the stern of Captain Sugilite's ship, nibbling thoughtfully on the end of a tendril of her coppery hair as she watched the Lady Polina attend to the broken arm of Gregarion the Sorcerer.

The princess wore a short, pale-green Dryad tunic, and there was a smudge of ash on one of her cheeks. On the deck above she could hear the measured beat of the drum that paced the oar strokes of Sugilite's sailors as they rowed upstream from the ash-choked city of Echelon.  


\--------------------------

  
It was all absolutely dreadful, she decided. What had begun as merely another move in the interminable game of authority and rebellion against it that she had been playing with her father, the Emperor, for as long as she could remember had suddenly turned deadly serious.

She had never really intended for things to go this far when she and Master Jeeves had crept from the Imperial Palace in Tol Maheshwar that night so many weeks ago. Jeeves had soon deserted her - he had been no more than a temporary convenience, anyway - and now she was caught up with this strange group of grim-faced people from the north in a quest she could not even understand.

 

The Lady Polina, whose very name sent a chill through the princess, had rather bluntly informed her in the Wood of the Dryads that the game was over and that no evasion, wheedling, or coaxing would alter the fact that she, Princess Connie, would stand in the Hall of the Hroden King on her sixteenth birthday - in chains if necessary.

Connie knew with absolute certainty that Lady Polina had meant exactly that, and she had a momentary vision of being dragged, clanking and rattling in her chains, to stand in total humiliation in that grim hall while hundreds of bearded Sangrians laughed at her. That had to be avoided at any cost. And so it had been that she had accompanied them - not willingly, perhaps - but never openly rebellious. The hint of steel in Lady Polina's eyes always seemed to carry with it the suggestion of manacles and clinking chains, and that suggestion cowed the princess into obedience far more than all the Imperial power her father possessed had ever been able to do.  
  
Connie had only the faintest idea of what these people were doing. They seemed to be following someone or something, and the trail had led them here into the snake-infested swamps of Olivia. Isyaki seemed to be somehow involved, throwing frightful obstacles in their path, and Queen Holly Green Agate also seemed to take an interest, even going so far as to have young Steven abducted.  
  
Connie interrupted her musing to look across the cabin at the boy. Why would the queen of Olivia want him? He was so ordinary. He was a peasant, a scullion, a nobody.

He was a nice enough boy, certainly, with rather plain, sandy hair that kept tumbling down across his forehead, making her fingers itch to push it back. He had a nice enough face - in a plain sort of way - and he was somebody she could talk to when she was lonely or frightened, and somebody she could fight with when she felt peevish, since he was only slightly older than she was.

But he completely refused to treat her with the respect due her - he probably didn't even know how. Why all this excruciating interest in him? She pondered that, looking thoughtfully at him.  
  
She was doing it again. Angrily she jerked her eyes from his face. Why was she always watching him? Each time her thoughts wandered, her eyes automatically sought out his face, and it wasn't really that exciting a face to look at. She had even caught herself making up excuses to put herself into places where she could watch him. It was stupid!   
  
Connie nibbled at her hair and thought and nibbled some more, until once again her eyes went back to their minute study of Steven's features.

 

\-------------------  
  
"Is he going to be okay?" Amethyst, the Earl of Crenellan, rumbled, tugging absently at her great lilac beard as she watched the Lady Polina put the finishing touches on Gregarion's sling.   
  
"Thankfully, it's a simple fracture," she replied professionally, putting away her bandages. "And the old fool heals fast."   
  
Gregarion winced as he shifted his newly splinted arm. "Jimminy, you didn't have to be so rough, Pearl." His rust-colored old tunic showed several dark mud smears and a new rip, evidence of his encounter with a tree.   
  
"It had to be set, Greg," she told him. "You didn't want it to heal crooked, did you?"   
  
"I think you actually enjoyed it," he accused.   
  
"Next time you can set it yourself," she suggested coolly, smoothing her gray dress.   
  
"I need a drink," Greg grumbled to the hulking Amethyst.   
  
The Earl of Crenellan went to the narrow door. "Would you have a tankard of ale brought for Gregarion?" she asked the sailor outside.   
  
"How is he?" the sailor inquired.   
  
"Bad-tempered," Amethyst replied. "And he'll probably get worse if he doesn't get a drink pretty soon."   
  
"I'll go at once," the sailor said.   
  
"Good choice."   
  
This was yet another confusing thing for Connie. The noblemen in their party all treated this shabby-looking old man with enormous respect; but so far as she could tell, he didn't even have a title.

She could determine with exquisite precision the exact difference between a baron and a general of the Imperial Legions, between a grand duke of Shwar and a crown prince of Flaxia, between the Hroden Warder and the king of the Wy-Atians; but she had not the faintest idea where sorcerers fit in. The materially oriented mind of Shwar refused even to admit that sorcerers existed. While it was quite true that Lady Polina, with titles from half the kingdoms of the West, was the most respected woman in the world, Gregarion was a vagabond, a vagrant, frequently a public nuisance. And Steven, she reminded herself, was his grandson.  
  
"I think it's time you told us what happened, father," Lady Polina was saying to her patient.   
  
"I'd really rather not talk about it," he replied shortly.   
  
She turned to Princess Vidalia, the peculiar little Q’zarnian noblewoman with the sharp face and sardonic wit, who lounged on a bench with an impudent expression on her face.

 

"Well, V?" she asked her.   
  
"I'm sure you can see my position, old friend," the princess apologized to Gregarion with a great show of regret. "If I try to keep secrets, she'll only force things out of me - unpleasantly, I imagine."   
  
Gregarion looked at her with a stony face, then snorted with disgust.   
  
"It's not that I want to say anything, you realize."   
  
Gregarion turned away.   
  
"I knew you'd understand."   
  
"The story, Viddy!" Amethyst insisted impatiently. "It's really very simple," V told him.   
  
"But you're going to complicate it, right?"   
  
"Just tell us what happened, V," Polina said.   
  
The little woman perked up on her bench. "It's not really much of a story," she began. "We located Andy’s trail and followed it down into Olivia about three weeks ago. We had a few encounters with some Olivian border guards - nothing very serious. Anyway, the trail of the Ward turned east almost as soon as it crossed the border. That was a surprise. Andy had been headed for Olivia with so much single-mindedness that we'd both assumed that he'd made some kind of arrangement with Holly Green. Maybe that's what he wanted everybody to think. He's very clever, and Holly’s notorious for involving herself in things that don't really concern her."   
  
"I've attended to that," Lady Polina said somewhat grimly.   
  
"What happened?" Gregarion asked her.   
  
"I'll tell you about it later, father. Go on, V."   
  
V shrugged. "There isn't a great deal more to it. We followed Andy’s trail into one of those ruined cities up near the border of Old Laz. Gregarion had a visitor there - at least he said he did. I didn't see anybody. At any rate, he told me that something had happened to change our plans and that we were going to have to turn around and come on downriver to Echelon to rejoin all of you. He didn't have time to explain much more, because the jungles were suddenly alive with Isyaki - either looking for us or for Andy, we never found out which. Since then we've been dodging Murgos and Olivians both - traveling at night, hiding - that sort of thing. We sent a messenger once. Did he ever get through?"   
  
"The day before yesterday," Polina replied. "He had a fever, though, and it took a while to get your message from him."   
  
Vidalia nodded. "Anyway, there were Mareks with the Isyaki, and they were trying to find us with their minds. Greg was doing something to keep them from locating us that way. Whatever it was must have taken a great deal of concentration, because he wasn't paying too much attention to where he was going. Early this morning we were leading the horses through a patch of swamp. Greg was sort of stumbling along with his mind on other things, and that was when the tree fell on him."   
  
"I might have guessed," Polina said. "Did someone make it fall?"   
  
"I don't think so," V answered. "It might have been an old deadfall, but I rather doubt it. It was rotten at the center. I tried to warn him, but he walked right under it."   
  
"All right," Greg said.   
  
"I did try to warn you."   
  
"Yes, yes I get it."   
  
"I wouldn't want them to think I didn't try to warn you," V protested.   
  
Polina shook her head and spoke with a profound note of disappointment in her voice. "Father!"   
  
"Just let it lie, Pearl," Greg told her.   
  
"I dug him out from under the tree and patched him up as best I could," V went on. "Then I stole that little boat and we started downriver. We were doing fine until all this dust started falling."   
  
"What did you do with the horses?" Ruby asked. Connie was a little afraid to this tall, silent Ainur lord with her shaved head, her black leather clothing, and her flowing crimson scalp lock. She never seemed to smile, and the expression on her cherubic face at even the mention of the word "Isyaki" was as bleak as stone. The only thing that even slightly humanized her was her overwhelming concern for horses.   
  
"They're all right," V assured him. "I left them picketed where the Olives won't find them. They'll be fine where they are until we pick them up."   
  
"You said when you came aboard that Aquamarine has the Ward now," Pearl said to Greg. "How did that happen?"   
  
The old man shrugged. "Tile didn't go into any of the details. All she told me was that Aqua was waiting when Andy crossed the border into Sivu Isyak. Andy managed to escape, but he had to leave the Ward behind."   
  
"Did you speak with Tile?"   
  
"With her mind," Gregarion answered.   
  
"Did she say why the Master wants us to go to the Vale?"   
  
"No. It probably never occurred to her to ask. You know how Tile is."   
  
"It's going to take months, father," Polina objected with a worried frown. "It's two hundred and fifty leagues to the Vale."   
  
"Grey wants us to go there," he answered. "I'm not going to start disobeying her after all these years."   
  
"And in the meantime, Aquamarine’s got the Ward at Fy Sivu."   
  
"It's not going to do him any good, Pearl. Black herself couldn't make the Ward submit to her, and she tried for over two thousand years. I know where Fy Sivu is; Aquamarine can't hide it from me. She'll be there with the Ward when I decide to go take it away from her. I know how to deal with that magician." He said the word "magician" with a note of profound contempt in his voice.   
  
"What's Andy going to be doing all that time?'   
  
"Andy's got problems of his own. Tile says that he's moved Black from the place where he had him hidden. I think we can depend on him to keep Black Diamond's body as far away from Fy Sivu as he possibly can. Actually, things have worked out rather well. I was getting a little tired of chasing Andy anyway."

 

\----------------------------------------------  
  
Connie found all this a bit confusing. Why were they all so caught up in the movements of a strangely named pair of Alabastian sorcerers and this mysterious jewel which everyone seemed to covet?

To her, one jewel was much the same as another. Her childhood had been surrounded by such opulence that she had long since ceased to attach much importance to ornaments. At the moment, her only adornment consisted of a pair of tiny gold earrings shaped like little acorns, and her fondness for them arose not so much from the fact that they were gold but rather from the tinkling sound the cunningly contrived clappers inside them made when she moved her head.  
  
All of this sounded like one of the Morn myths she'd heard from a storyteller in her father's court years before. There had been a magic jewel in that, she remembered.

It was stolen by the God of the Alabastians, White Diamond, and rescued by a sorcerer and some Sangrian kings who put it on the pommel of a sword kept in the throne room at Hrodenheim. It was somehow supposed to protect the West from some terrible disaster that would happen if it were lost. Curious - the name of the sorcerer in the legend was Gregarion, the same as that of this old man.  
  
But that would make him thousands of years old, which was ridiculous! He must have been named after the ancient myth hero - unless he'd assumed the name to impress people.   
  
Once again her eyes wandered to Steven's face. The boy sat quietly in one corner of the cabin, his eyes grave and his expression serious.

She thought perhaps that it was his seriousness that so piqued her curiosity and kept drawing her eyes to him. Other boys she had known - nobles and the sons of nobles - had tried to be charming and witty, but Steven never tried to joke or to say clever things to try to amuse her.

She was not entirely certain how to take that. Was he such a lump that he didn't know how he was supposed to behave? Or perhaps he knew but didn't care enough to make the effort. He might at least try - even if only occasionally.

How could she possibly deal with him if he was going to refuse flatly to make a fool of himself for her benefit?  
  
She reminded herself sharply that she was angry with him. He had said that Queen Holly Green Agate had been the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, and it was far, far too early to forgive him for such an outrageous statement.

She was definitely going to have to make him suffer extensively for that insulting lapse. Her fingers toyed absently with one of the curls cascading down the side of her face, her eyes boring into Steven's face.  


\----------------

  
The following morning ashfall that was the result of a massive volcanic eruption somewhere in Sivu Isyak had diminished sufficiently to make the deck of the ship habitable again.

The jungle along the riverbank was still partially obscured in the dusty haze, but the air was clear enough to breathe, and Connie escaped from the sweltering cabin below decks with relief.  
  
Steven was sitting in the sheltered spot near the bow of the ship where he usually sat and he was deep in conversation with Gregarion.

Connie noted with a certain detachment that he had neglected to comb his hair that morning. She resisted her immediate impulse to go fetch comb and brush to rectify the situation. She drifted instead with artful dissimulation to a place along the rail where, without seeming to, she could conveniently eavesdrop.  
  
"--It's always been there," Steven was saying to his grandfather. "It used to just talk to me - tell me when I was being childish or stupid - that sort of thing. It seemed to be off in one corner of my mind all by itself."   
  
Gregarion nodded, scratching absently at his beard with his good hand. "It seems to be completely separate from you," he observed. "Has this voice in your head ever actually done anything? Besides talk to you, I mean."   
  
Steven's face grew thoughtful. "I don't think so. It tells me how to do things, but I think that I'm the one who has to do them. When we were at Holly’s palace, I think it took me out of my body to go look for Aunt Pearl." He frowned. "No," he corrected. "When I stop and think about it, it told me how to do it, but I was the one who actually did it. Once we were out, I could feel it beside me - it's the first time we've ever been separate. I couldn't actually see it, though. It did take over for a few minutes, I think. It talked to Holly to smooth things over and to hide what we'd been doing."   
  
"You've been busy since V and I left, haven't you?"   
  
Steven nodded glumly. "Most of it was pretty awful. I burned Bloodstone to ashes. Did you know that?"   
  
"Your Aunt told me about it."   
  
"He slapped her in the face," Steven told him. "I was going to go after him with my knife for that, but the voice told me to do it a different way. I hit him with my hand and said 'fry.' That's all, just 'fry' and he caught on fire. I was going to put it out until Aunt Pearl told me he was the one who killed my mother and father. Then I made the fire hotter. He begged me to put it out, but I didn't do it." He shuddered.   
  
"I tried to warn you about that," Gregarion reminded him gently. "I told you that you weren't going to like it very much after it was over."   
  
Steven sighed. "I should have listened to you, Grandfather. Aunt Pearl says that once you've used this--" He floundered, looking for a word.   
  
"Power?" Gregarion suggested.   
  
"All right," Steven assented. "She says that once you've used it, you never forget how, and you'll keep doing it again and again. I wish I had used my knife instead. Then this thing in me never would have gotten loose."   
  
"You're wrong, you know," Gregarion told him quite calmly. "You've been bursting at the seams with it for several months now. You've used it without knowing it at least a half dozen times that I know about."   
  
Steven stared at him incredulously.   
  
"Remember that crazy monk just after we crossed into Shwar? When you touched him, you made so much noise that I thought for a moment you'd killed him."   
  
"You said Aunt Pearl did that."   
  
"I lied," the old man admitted casually. "I do that fairly often. The whole point, though, is that you've always had this ability. It was bound to come out sooner or later. I wouldn't feel too unhappy about what you did to Bloodstone. It was a little exotic perhaps - not exactly the way I might have done it - but there was poetic justice to it, after all."   
  
"It's always going to be there, then?"   
  
"Always. That's the way it is, I'm afraid."   
  
The Princess Connie felt rather smug about that. Gregarion had just confirmed something she herself had told Steven. If the boy would just stop being so stubborn, his Aunt and his grandfather and of course she herself - all of whom knew much better than he what was right and proper and good for him - could shape his life to their satisfaction with little or no difficulty.   
  
"Let's get back to this other voice of yours," Gregarion suggested. "I need to know more about it. I don't want you carrying an enemy around in your mind."   
  
"It's not an enemy," Steven insisted. "It's on our side."   
  
"It might seem that way," Gregarion observed, "but things aren't always what they seem. I'd be a lot more comfortable if I knew just exactly what it is. I don't like surprises."   
  
The Princess Connie, however, was already lost in thought. Dimly, at the back of her devious and complex little mind, an idea was beginning to take shape - an idea with very interesting possibilities.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More before this day is up.
> 
> Tired from the jet lag, hence the delay. I'm sorry my darlings. I'm going to edit the prologue to include a thank you message to Boot and other readers, and also a second chapter by today.
> 
> If you haven't noticed, I'm planning to include some new characters in this volume, and I can't wait to see how they'll be written ^_^


	3. Chasing Stars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Connie attempts to win her 'captors' over. But first, she wants to figure out where they stand in the world. Steven included. Steven especially.

**THE TRIP UP** to the rapids of the River of the Serpent took the better part of a week. Although it was still swelteringly hot, they had all by now grown at least partially accustomed to the climate. Princess Connie spent most of her time sitting on deck with Aunt Pearl, pointedly ignoring Steven. She did, however, glance frequently his way to see if she could detect any signs of suffering.   
  
Since her life was entirely in the hands of these people, Connie felt keenly the necessity for winning them over. Gregarion would be no problem. A few winsome little-girl smiles, a bit of eyelash fluttering, and a spontaneous-seeming kiss or two would wrap him neatly around one of her fingers.

That particular campaign could be conducted at any time she felt it convenient, but Polina was a different matter. For one thing, Connie was awed by the lady's spectacular beauty. Polina was flawless. Even the white lock in the midnight of her hair was not so much a defect as it was a sort of accent - a personal trademark.

Most disconcerting to the princess were Polina's eyes. Depending on her mood, they ranged in color from gray to a deep, deep blue and they saw through everything. No dissimulation was possible in the face of that calm, steady gaze.

Each time the princess looked into those eyes, she seemed to hear the clink of chains. She definitely had to get on Polina's good side.  
  
"Lady Polina?" the princess said one morning as they sat together on deck, while the steaming, gray-green jungle slid by on either bank and the sweating sailors labored at their oars.   
  
"Yes, dear?" Polina looked up from the button she was sewing on one of Steven's tunics. She wore a pale blue dress, open at the throat in the heat.   
  
"What is sorcery? I was always told that such things didn't exist." It seemed like a good place to start the discussion.   
  
Polina smiled at her. "Shwarean education tends to be a bit one-sided."   
  
"Is it a trick of some kind?" Connie persisted. "I mean, is it like showing people something with one hand while you're taking something away with the other?" She toyed with the laces on her sandals.   
  
"No, dear. It's nothing at all like that."   
  
"Exactly how much can one do with it?"   
  
"We've never explored that particular boundary," Polina replied, her needle still busy. "When something has to be done, we do it. We don't bother worrying about whether we can or not. Different people are better at different things, though. It's somewhat on the order of some men being better at carpentry while others specialize in stonemasonry."   
  
"Steven's a sorcerer, isn't he? How much can he do?" Now why had she asked that?   
  
"I was wondering where this was leading," Polina said, giving the tiny girl a penetrating look.   
  
Connie blushed slightly.   
  
"Don't chew on your hair, dear," Polina told her. "You'll split the ends."   
  
Connie quickly removed the curl from between her teeth.   
  
"We're not sure what Steven can do yet," Polina continued. "It's probably much too early to tell. He seems to have talent. He certainly makes enough noise whenever he does something, and that's a fair indication of his potential."   
  
"He'll probably be a very powerful sorcerer then."   
  
A faint smile touched Polina's lips. "Probably so," she replied. "Always assuming that he learns to control himself."   
  
"Well," Connie declared, "we'll just have to teach him to control himself then, won't we?"   
  
Polina looked at her for a moment, and then she began to laugh. Connie felt a bit sheepish, but she also laughed.   
  
Steven, who was standing not far away, turned to look at them. "What's so funny?" he asked.   
  
"Nothing you'd understand, dear," Aunt Pearl told him.   
  
He looked offended and moved away, his back stiff and his face set. Connie and Aunt Pearl laughed again.   


\--------------------------------------------------------

  
When Captain Sugilite's ship finally reached the point where rocks and swiftly tumbling water made it impossible to go any farther, they moored her to a large tree on the north bank, and the party prepared to go ashore.

 

Amethyst stood sweating in her mail shirt beside her friend Sugilite, watching Ruby oversee the unloading of the horses.

 

"If you happen to see my sister, give her my greetings," the purple-bearded gem said.  
  
Sugilite nodded. "I'll probably be near Crenellan sometime during the coming winter."   
  
"I don't know that you need to tell her that I know about her pregnancy. She'll probably want to surprise me with our sister when I get home. I wouldn't want to spoil that for her."   
  
Sugilite looked a little surprised. "I thought you enjoyed spoiling things for her, Amethyst."   
  
"Maybe it's time that Carnelian and I made peace with each other. This little war of ours was amusing when we were younger, but it might not be a bad idea to put it aside now - for the sake of the children, if nothing else."   
  
Gregarion came up on deck and joined the two bearded Wy-Atians. "Go to Van Sangria," he told Captain Sugilite. "Tell Thur-Man where we are and what we're doing. Have him get word to the others. Tell him that I absolutely forbid their going to war with the Alabastians just now. Aquamarine has the Orb at Fy Sivu, and if there's a war, Tor Unalaq will seal the borders of Sivu Isyak. Things are going to be difficult enough for us without that to contend with."   
  
"I'll tell him," Sugilite replied doubtfully. "I don't think he'll like it much, though."   
  
"He doesn't have to like it," Gregarion said bluntly. "He just has to do it."   
  
Connie, standing not far away, felt a little startled when she heard the shabby-looking old man issuing his peremptory commands. How could he speak so to sovereign kings? And what if Steven, as a sorcerer, should someday have a similar authority? She turned and gazed at the young man who was helping Bismuth the smith calm an excited horse. He didn't look authoritative. She pursed her lips. A robe of some kind might help, she thought, and maybe some sort of book of magic in his hands - and perhaps just the hint of a beard. She dreamt for a moment, her eyes glazing over, imagining him so robed, booked and bearded.   
  
Steven, obviously feeling her eyes on him, looked quickly in her direction, his expression questioning. He was so ordinary. The image of this plain, unassuming boy in the finery she had concocted for him in her mind was suddenly ludicrous.

Without meaning to, she laughed. Steven flushed and stiffly turned his back on her.  
  
Since the rapids of the River of the Serpent effectively blocked all further navigation upriver, the trail leading up into the hills was quite broad, indicating that most travelers struck out overland at that point.   
  
As they rode up out of the valley in the mid-morning sunlight, they passed rather quickly out of the tangled jungle growth lining the river and moved into a hardwood forest that was much more to Connie's liking.

At the crest of the first rise, they even encountered a breeze that seemed to brush away the sweltering heat and stink of Olivia’s festering swamps. Connie's spirits lifted immediately.

 

She considered the company of Princess Vidalia, but she was dozing in her saddle, her large bulbous hair resting gently against her horse's mane, and Connie was just a bit afraid of the sharp-nosed Q’zarnian. She recognized immediately that the cynical, wise little woman could probably read her like a book, and she didn't really care for that idea.

Instead she rode forward along the column to ride with Baron Jasper, who led the way, as was his custom. Her move was prompted in part by the desire to get as far away from the steaming river as possible, but there was more to it than that.

It occurred to her that this might be an excellent opportunity to question this Flaxenite nobleman about a matter that interested her.  
  
"Your Highness," the armored knight said respectfully as she pulled her horse in beside his huge charger, "do you think it's wise to ride alongside me, in the forefront?"   
  
"Who would be so foolish as to attack the bravest knight in the world?" she asked with artful innocence.   
  
The baron's expression grew melancholy, and he sighed.   
  
"And why so great a sigh, Sir Knight?" she bantered.   
  
"It's nothing, your Highness," he replied.   
  
They rode along in silence through the dappled shade where insects hummed and darted and small, scurrying things skittered and rustled in the bushes at the side of the trail.   
  
"Tell me," the princess said finally, "have you known Gregarion for long?"   
  
"All my life, your Highness."   
  
"Is he highly regarded in Flaxia?"   
  
"Highly regarded? Holy Gregarion is the paramount man in the world! Surely thou knowest that, Princess."   
  
"I'm Shwarean, Baron Jasper," she pointed out. "Our familiarity with sorcerers is limited. Would an Flaxia describe Gregarion as a man of noble birth?"   
  
Jasper laughed. "Your Highness, holy Gregarion's birth is so far lost in the dim reaches of antiquity that thy question has no meaning."   
  
Connie frowned. She did not particularly like being laughed at. "Is he or is he not a nobleman?" she pressed.   
  
"He is Gregarion," Jasper replied, as if that explained everything. "There are hundreds of barons, earls by the score, and lords without number, but there is only one Gregarion. **_All_ ** men give way to him."   
  
She beamed at him. "And what about Lady Polina?"   
  
Jasper blinked, and Connie saw that she was going too fast for him. "The Lady Polina is revered above all women," he said in puzzled response. "Princess, if I could perhaps ask you about the reason behind your line of questioning, I might provide you with a more satisfactory response."   
  
She laughed. "My dear Baron, it's nothing important or serious just curiosity, and a way to pass the time as we ride."   


\---------------

  
Bismuth the smith came forward at a trot just then, his sorrel horse's hoofbeats thudding on the packed earth of the trail. "Mistress Pearl wants you to wait for a bit," he told them.   
  
"Is anything wrong?" Connie asked.   
  
"No. It's just that there's a bush not far from the trail that she recognized. She wants to harvest the leaves - I think they have certain medicinal uses. She says it's very rare and only found in this part of Olivia."

The smith's plain, honest face was respectful as it always was when he spoke of Polina. Connie had certain private suspicions about Bismuth's feelings, but she kept them to herself.

"Oh," he went on, "she said to warn you about the bush. There might be others around. It's about a foot tall and has very shiny green leaves and a little purple flower. It's deadly poisonous - even to touch."  
  
"We will not stray from the trail, Goodman Bismuth," Jasper assured him, "but will abide here against the lady's permission to proceed." Bismuth nodded and rode on back down the trail.   
  
Connie and Jasper pulled their horses into the shade of a broad tree and sat waiting. "How do the Flaxenites regard Steven?" Connie asked suddenly.   
  
"Steven is a good lad," Jasper replied, somewhat confused.   
  
"But hardly noble," she prompted him.   
  
"Princess," Jasper told her delicately, "your education, I fear, has failed to properly furnish you. Steven is of the line of Gregarion and Polina. Though he hasn’t a rank such as you or me, his blood is the noblest in the world. I would give precedence to him without question should he ask it of me - which he would not, being a modest boy. During our sojourn at the court of King Lavirintos at I'chir Gelar, a young countess pursued him most fervently, thinking to gain status and prestige by marriage to him."   
  
" **_Really?"_ ** Connie asked with a hard little edge coming into her voice.   
  
"She sought betrothal and trapped him often with blatant invitation to dalliance and sweet conversation."   
  
"A beautiful countess?"   
  
"One of the great beauties of the kingdom."   
  
"I see." Connie's voice was like ice.   
  
"Have I given offense, Highness?"   
  
"It's not important."   
  
Jasper sighed again.   
  
"What is it now?" she snapped.   
  
"I perceive that my faults are many."   
  
"I thought you were supposed to be the perfect man." She regretted that instantly.   
  
"Nay, Highness. I am… Far from perfect. Some might even say weak.”   
  
"A bit undiplomatic, perhaps, but that's no great flaw - in an Flaxen."   
  
"Cowardice is, your Highness."   
  
She laughed at the notion. "Cowardice? You?"   
  
"I have found that fault in myself," he admitted.   
  
"Don't be ridiculous," she scoffed. "If anything, your fault lies in the other direction."   
  
"It is difficult to believe, I know," he replied. "But I assure you with great shame that I have felt the grip of fear upon my heart."   


\--------------

  
Connie was baffled by the knight's mournful confession. She was struggling to find some proper reply when a great crashing rush burst out of the undergrowth a few yards away.

With a sudden start of panic, her horse wheeled and bolted. She caught only the briefest glimpse of something large and tawny leaping out of the bushes at her - large, tawny, and with a great gaping mouth.

She tried desperately to cling to her saddle with one hand and to control her terrified horse with the other, but its frantic flight took him under a low branch, and she was swept off its back to land unceremoniously in the middle of the trail. She rolled to her hands and knees and then froze as she faced the beast that had so clumsily burst forth from concealment.  
  
She saw at once that the lion was not very old. She noted that, though his body was fully developed, he had only a half grown mane.

Clearly, he was an adolescent, unskilled at hunting. He roared with frustration as he watched the fleeing horse disappear back down the trail, and his tail lashed.

The princess felt a momentary touch of amusement - he was so young, so awkward. Then her amusement was replaced by irritation with this clumsy young beast who had caused her humiliating unhorsing. She rose to her feet, brushed off her knees, and looked at him sternly.

"Shoo!" she said with an insistent flip of her hand. She was, after all, a princess, and he was only a lion - a very young and foolish lion.  
  
The yellow eyes fell on her then and narrowed slightly. The lashing tail grew suddenly quite still. The young lion's eyes widened with a sort of dreadful intensity, and he crouched, his belly going low to the ground. His upper lip lifted to reveal his very long, white teeth. He took one slow step toward her, his great paw touching down softly.   
  
"Don't you **_dare_ ** ," she told him indignantly.   
  
"Remain quite still, Princess," Jasper warned her in a deathly quiet voice. From the corner of her eye she saw him slide out of his saddle. The lion's eyes flickered toward him with annoyance.   
  
Carefully, one step at a time, Jasper crossed the intervening space until he had placed his armored body between the lion and the princess. The Lion watched him warily, not seeming to realize what he was doing until it was too late.

Then, cheated of another meal, the cat's eyes went flat with rage. Jasper drew his sword very carefully; then, to Connie's amazement, he passed it back hilt - first to her.

 

"So that you can have a way to defend yourself, should I fail to withstand him," the knight explained.  
  
Doubtfully, Connie took hold of the huge hilt with both hands. When Jasper released his grip on the blade, however, the point dropped immediately to the ground, taking her with it. Try though she might, Connie could not even lift the huge sword.   
  
Snarling, the lion crouched even lower. His tail lashed furiously for a moment, then stiffened out behind him.

 

"Jasper, look out!" Connie screamed, still struggling with the sword.  
  
The lion leaped.   
  
Jasper flung his steel-cased arms wide and stepped forward to meet the cat's charge. They came together with a resounding crash, and Jasper locked his arms around the beast's body.

The lion wrapped his huge paws around Jasper's shoulders and his claws screeched deafeningly as they raked the steel of the knight's armor. His teeth grated and ground as he gnawed and bit at Jasper's helmeted head. Jasper tightened his deadly embrace.  
  
Connie scrambled out of the way, dragging the sword behind her, and stared wide-eyed with fright at the dreadful struggle.   
  
The lion's clawing became more desperate, and great, deep scratches appeared on Jasper's armor as the Mimbrate's arms tightened inexorably. The roars became yowls of pain, and the lion struggled now not to fight or kill, but to escape. He wriggled and thrashed and tried to bite. His hind paws came up to rake furiously on Jasper's armored trunk. His yowls grew more shrill, more filled with panic.   
  
With a superhuman effort, Jasper jerked his arms together. Connie heard the cracking of bones with a sickening clarity, and an enormous fountain of blood erupted from the cat's mouth. The young lion's body quivered, his eyes bulging from their sockets, and his head dropped. Jasper unclenched his locked hands, and the dead beast slid limply from his grasp to the ground at his feet.   
  
Stunned, the princess stared at the stupendous man in blood-smeared and clawed armor standing before her. She had just witnessed the impossible. Jasper had killed a lion with no weapon but his mighty arms-and all for her!   
  
Without knowing why, she found herself crowing with delight. " **_Jasper!"_ ** She sang his name. "You are my knight!"   
  
Still panting from his efforts, Jasper pushed up his visor. His blue eyes were wide, as if her words had struck him with a stunning impact.

Then he sank to his knees before her. "Your Highness," he said in a choked voice, "I pledge to thee here upon the body of this beast to be thy true and faithful knight for so long as I have breath."  
  
Deep inside her, Connie stopped in her tracks as she felt a profound sort of click - the sound of two things, fated from time's beginning to come together, finally meeting. Something - she did not know exactly what - but something very important had happened there in that sun-dappled glade.   
  
And then Amethyst, huge and imposing, came galloping up the trail with Ruby at her side and the others not far behind. "What in the world happened here?" the big Wy-Atian demanded, swinging down from her horse.   
  
Connie waited until they had all reined in to make her announcement. "The lion there attacked me," she said, trying to make it sound like an everyday occurrence. "Jasper killed him with his bare hands."   
  
"I was in fact wearing these, Highness," the still-kneeling knight reminded her, holding up his gauntleted fists.   
  
"It was the bravest thing I've ever seen in my life," Connie swept on.   
  
"Why are you down on your knees?" Amethyst asked Jasper. "Are you hurt?"   
  
"I have just made Sir Jasper my very own knight," Connie declared, "and as is quite proper, he knelt to receive that honor from my hands."

From the corner of her eye she saw Steven in the act of sliding down from his horse. He was scowling like a thundercloud. Silently, Connie exulted. Leaning forward then, she placed a sisterly kiss on Jasper's brow. "Rise, Sir Knight," she commanded, and Jasper creaked to his feet.  
  
Connie was enormously pleased with herself.   
  
The remainder of the day passed without incident. They crossed a low range of hills and came down into a little valley as the sun settled slowly into a cloudbank off to the west. The valley was watered by a small stream, sparkling and cold, and they stopped there to set up their night's encampment. Jasper, in his new role as knight-protector, was suitably attentive, and Connie accepted his service graciously, casting occasional covert glances at Steven to be certain that he was noticing everything.   
  
Somewhat later, when Jasper had gone to see to his horse and Steven had stomped off to sulk, she sat demurely on a moss-covered log congratulating herself on the day's accomplishments.   
  
"You're playing a cruel game, Princess," Bismuth told her bluntly from the spot a few feet away where he was building a fire.   
  
Connie was startled. So far as she could remember, Bismuth had never spoken directly to her since she had joined the party.

The smith was obviously uncomfortable in the presence of royalty and, indeed, seemed actually to avoid her. Now, however, he looked straight into her face, and his tone was reproving.  
  
"I don't know what you're talking about," she declared.   
  
"I think you do." His plain, honest fact was serious, and his gaze was steady.   
  
Connie lowered her eyes and flushed slowly.   
  
"I've seen village girls play this same game," he continued. "Nothing good ever comes of it."   
  
"I'm not trying to hurt anybody, Bismuth. There isn't really anything of that sort between Jasper and me - we both know that."   
  
"Steven doesn't."   
  
Connie was amazed. "Steven?"   
  
"Isn't that what it's all about?"   
  
"Of course not!" she objected indignantly. Bismuth's look was profoundly skeptical.   
  
"Such a thing never entered my mind," Connie rushed on. "It's absolutely absurd."   
  
"Really?"   
  
Connie's bold front collapsed. "He's so stubborn," she complained. "He just won't do anything the way he's supposed to."   
  
"He's an honest boy. Whatever else he is or might become, he's still the plain, simple boy he was at Alger’s farm. He doesn't know the rules of the gentry. He won't lie to you or flatter you or say things he doesn't really feel. I think something very important is going to happen to him before very long - I don't know what - but I do know it's going to take all his strength and courage. Don't weaken him with all this childishness."   
  
"Oh, Bismuth," she said with a great sigh. "What am I going to do?"   
  
"Be honest. Say only what's in your heart. Don't say one thing and mean another. That won't work with him."   
  
"I know. That's what makes it all so difficult. He was raised one way, and I was raised another. We're never going to get along." She sighed again.   
  
Bismuth smiled, a gentle, almost whimsical smile. "It's not all that bad, Princess," he told her. "You'll fight a great deal at first. You're almost as stubborn as he is, you know. You were born in different parts of the world, but you're not really all that different inside. You'll shout at each other and shake your fingers in each others' faces; but in time that will pass, and you won't even remember what you were shouting about. Some of the best marriages I know of started that way."   
  
"Marriage!"   
  
"That's what you've got in mind, isn't it?"   
  
She stared at him incredulously. Then she suddenly laughed. "Dear, dear Bismuth," she said. "You don't understand at all, do you?"   
  
"I understand what I see," he replied. "And what I see is a young girl doing everything she possibly can to catch a young man."   
  
Connie faltered. "That's… That's completely out of the question, you know - even if I felt that way - which of course I don't."   
  
"Naturally not." He looked slightly amused.   
  
"Dear Bismuth," she said again, "I can't even allow myself such thoughts. You forget who I am."   
  
"That isn't very likely," he told her. "You're usually very careful to keep the fact firmly in front of everybody."   
  
"Don't you know what it means?"   
  
He looked a bit perplexed. "I don't quite follow."   
  
"I'm an Imperial Princess, the jewel of the Empire, and I belong to the Empire. I'll have absolutely no voice in the decision about whom I'm going to marry. That decision will be made by my father and the Council of Advisers. My husband will be rich and powerful - probably much older than I am - and my marriage to him will be to the advantage of the Empire and the House of Maheshwaran. I probably won't even be consulted in the matter."   
  
Bismuth looked stunned. "That's outrageous!" he objected.   
  
"Not really," she said lamely. "My family has the right to protect its interests, and I'm an extremely valuable asset to the Maheshwarans." She sighed again, a forlorn little sigh. "It might be nice, though - to be able to choose for myself, I mean. If I could, I might even look at Steven the way you seem to think I have been looking - even though he's **_absolutely impossible_ ** . The way things are, though, all he can ever be is a friend."   
  
"I didn't know," he apologized, his plain, practical face melancholy.   
  
"Don't take it so seriously, Bismuth," she said lightly. "I've always known that this was the way things have to be."   
  
A large, glistening tear, however, welled into the corner of her eye, and Bismuth awkwardly put his work-worn hand on her arm to comfort her.

Without knowing why, she broke down, threw her arms around his neck, buried her face in his chest, and began sobbing. 

  
"There, there," he said, clumsily patting her shaking shoulder. "There, there" 


	4. From Here to There

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Fellowship plot their journey through to the Vale. Complications that soon arise make them reconsider what they formerly declared as off-limits. The Haunted Land of the Lazuli.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lapis being Lapis, of course we need to foreshadow as much of her backstory as possible before we include her.
> 
> Hence, Lanzalore. If you're expecting me to include her anytime soon though, you're fresh outta luck, because I'm going to slow burn her story as much as humanly possible.
> 
> Don't worry though, you'll be seeing her before this fic is through.

**STEVEN DID NOT SLEEP** well that night. Although he was young and inexperienced, he was not stupid, and Princess Connie had been fairly obvious. Over the months since she had joined them, he had seen her attitude toward him change until they had shared a rather specialized kind of friendship. He liked her; she liked him. Everything had been fine up to that point. So why couldn't she just leave it alone? 

Steven surmised that it probably had something to do with the inner workings of the female mind. As soon as a friendship passed a certain point - some obscure and secret boundary - a woman quite automatically became overwhelmed by a raging compulsion to complicate things.   
  
He was almost certain that her transparent little game with Jasper had been aimed at him, and he wondered if it might not be a good idea to warn the knight to spare him more heartbreak in the future. 

Connie's toying with the great man's affections was little more than the senseless cruelty of a spoiled child. Jasper must be warned. His Gelarite thick-headedness might easily cause him to overlook the obvious.   
  
And yet, Jasper had killed the lion for her. Such stupendous bravery could quite easily have overwhelmed the flighty little princess. 

What if her admiration and gratitude had pushed her over the line into infatuation? That possibility, coming to Steven as it did in those darkest hours just before dawn, banished all possibility of further sleep. He arose the next morning sandy-eyed and surly and with a terrible worry gnawing at him.   
  
As they rode out through the blue-tinged shadows of early morning with the slanting rays of the newly risen sun gleaming on the treetops above them, Steven fell in beside his grandfather, seeking the comfort of the old man's companionship. It was not only that, however. Connie was riding demurely with Aunt Pearl just ahead, and Steven felt very strongly that he should keep an eye on her.   
  
Mister Wolf rode in silence, looking cross and irritable, and he frequently dug his fingers under the splint on his left arm.   
  
"Leave it alone, father," Aunt Pearl told him without turning around.   
  
"It itches."   
  
"That's because it's healing. Just leave it alone."   
  
He grumbled about that under his breath.   
  
"Which route are you planning to take to the Vale?" she asked him.   
  
"We'll go around by way of Tol Corale," he replied.   
  
"The season's moving on, father," she reminded him. "If we take too long, we'll run into bad weather in the mountains."   
  
"I know that, Pearl. Would you rather cut straight across Lanzalore?"   
  
"Don't be absurd."   
  
"Is Lanzalore really all that dangerous?" Steven asked.   
  
Princess Connie turned in her saddle and gave him a withering look. "Don't you know  **_anything?_ ** " she asked him with towering superiority.   
  
Steven drew himself up, a dozen suitable responses to that coming to mind almost at once.   
  
Mister Wolf shook his head warningly. 

 

" _ Just let it pass, _ " he heard the old man’s voice in his head. " _ It's much too early to start in on that just now. _ "   
  
Steven clenched his teeth together.   
  


——————————————

  
They rode for an hour or more through the cool morning, and Steven gradually felt his temper improving. 

Then Ruby rode up to speak with Mister Wolf.

"There are some riders coming," she reported.   
  
"How many?" Wolf asked quickly.   
  
"A dozen or more - coming in from the west."   
  
"They could be Shwareans."   
  
"I'll see," Aunt Pearl murmured. She lifted her face and closed her eyes for a moment. "No," she said. "Not Shwar. Isyaki.”    
  
Ruby's eyes went flat. "Do we fight?" she asked with a dreadful kind of eagerness, a mailed fist materialising around her right hand.   
  
"No," Wolf replied curtly. "We hide."   
  
"There aren't really that many of them."   
  
"Never mind, Ruby," Wolf told him. "V," he called ahead, "there are some Isyaki coming toward us from the west. Warn the others and find us all a place to hide."   
  
V nodded curtly and galloped forward.   
  
"Are there any Mareks with them?" the old man asked Aunt Pearl.   
  
"I don't  **_think_ ** so," she answered with a small frown. "One of them has a strange mind, but he doesn't seem to be a Marek."   
  
V rode back quickly. "There's a thicket off to the right," she told them. "It's big enough to hide in."   
  
"Lets go, then," Wolf said.

 

\----------------------   
  
The thicket was fifty yards back among the larger trees. It appeared to be a patch of dense brush surrounding a small hollow. The ground in the hollow was marshy, and there was a spring at its center.   
  
V had swung down from her horse and was hacking a thick bush off close to the ground with her short sword. 

“Stay low," she told them. "I'll go back and brush out our tracks." She picked up the bush and wormed her way out of the thicket.   
  
"Be sure the horses don't make any noise," Wolf told Ruby. Ruby nodded, but her eyes showed her disappointment.   
  
Steven dropped to his knees and wormed his way through the thick brush until he reached the edge of the thicket; then he sank down on the leaves covering the ground to peer out between the gnarled and stumpy trunks.   
  
V, walking backward and swinging her bush, was sweeping leaves and twigs from the forest floor over the tracks they had made from the trail to the thicket. She was moving quickly, but was careful to obliterate their trail completely.   
  
From behind them, Steven heard a faint snap and rustle in the leaves, and Connie crawled up and sank to the ground at his side. 

 

"You shouldn't be this close to the edge of the brush," he told her in a low voice.   
  
"Neither should  **_you_ ** ," she retorted.   
  
He let that pass. The princess had a warm, fragrant scent about her; for some reason, that made Steven very nervous.   
  
"How far away do you think they are?" she whispered.   
  
"How would I know?"   
  
"You're a sorcerer, aren't you?"   
  
"I'm not that good at it."   
  
V finished brushing away the tracks and stood for a moment studying the ground as she looked for any trace of their passage she might have missed. Then she burrowed her way into the thicket and crouched down a few yards from Steven and Connie.   
  
"Lord Ruby wanted to fight them," Connie whispered to Steven. "Ruby always wants to fight when he sees Isyaki."   
  
"The Isyaki killed his parents when he was very young. He had to watch while they did it."   
  
She gasped. "How awful!"   
  
**_"If you children don't mind,"_ ** V said sarcastically, "I'm trying to listen for horses."   
  
Somewhere beyond the trail they had just left, Steven heard the thudding sound of horses' hooves moving at a trot. He sank down deeper into the leaves and watched, scarcely breathing.   
  
When the Isyaku appeared, there were about fifteen of them, mailshirted and with the scarred cheeks of their race. Their leader, however, was a man in a patched and dirty tunic and with coarse black hair. He was unshaven, and one of his eyes was out of line with its fellow. Steven knew him.   
  
V drew in a sharp breath with an audible hiss. "Myr," she muttered.   
  
"Who's Myr?" Connie whispered to Steven.   
  
"I'll tell you later," he whispered back. "Shush!"   
  
"Don't  **_shush_ ** me!" she flared.   
  
A stern look from V silenced them.   
  
Myr was talking sharply to the Isyaki, gesturing with short, jerky movements. Then he raised his hands with his fingers widespread and stabbed them forward to emphasize what he was saying. 

The Isyaki all nodded, their faces expressionless, and spread out along the trail, facing the woods and the thicket where Steven and the others were hiding. 

 

Myr moved farther up the trail. "Keep your eyes open," he shouted to them. "Let's go."   
  
The Isyaki started to move forward at a walk, their eyes searching. Two of them rode past the thicket so close that Steven could smell the sweat on their horses' flanks.   
  
"I'm getting tired of that man," one of them remarked to the other.   
  
"I wouldn't let it show," the second one advised.   
  
"I can take orders as well as any man," the first one said, "but that one's beginning to irritate me. I think he would look better with a knife between his shoulder blades."   
  
"I don't think he'd like that much, and it might be a little hard to manage."   
  
"I could wait until he was asleep."   
  
"I've never seen him sleep."   
  
"Everybody sleeps-- sooner or later."   
  
"It's up to you," the second replied with a shrug, "but I wouldn't try anything rash - unless you've given up the idea of ever seeing Fy Indraak again."   
  
The two of them moved on out of earshot.   
  
V crouched, gnawing nervously at a fingernail. Her eyes had narrowed to slits, and her sharp little face was intent. Then she began to swear under her breath.   
  
"What's wrong, V?" Steven whispered to him.   
  
"I've made a mistake," V answered irntably. "Let's go back to the others." She turned and crawled through the bushes toward the spring at the center of the thicket.   
  
Mister Wolf was seated on a log, scratching absently at his splinted arm. "Well?" he asked, looking up.   
  
"Fifteen of them," V replied shortly. "And an old friend."   
  
"It was Myr," Steven reported. "He seemed to be in charge."   
  
**_"Myr?"_ ** The old man's eyes widened with surprise.   
  
"He was giving orders and the Isyaki were following them," V said. "They didn't like it much, but they were doing what he told them to do. They seemed to be afraid of him. I think Myr's something more than an ordinary hireling."   
  
"Where's Fy Indraak?" Connie asked. At her question, Wolf turned sharply to regard her.   
  
"We heard two of them talking," she explained. "They said they were from Fy Indraak. I thought I knew the names of all the cities in Sivu Isyak, but I've never heard of that one."   
  
"You're sure they said Fy Indraak?" Wolf asked her, his eyes intent.   
  
"I heard the same thing," Steven told him. "That was the name they used Grandfather-- Fy Indraak."   
  
Mister Wolf stood up, his face suddenly grim. "We're going to have to hurry then. Tor Unalaq is preparing for war."   
  
"How do you know that?" Amethyst asked him.   
  
"Fy Indraak's a thousand leagues south of Vaas Indrak, and the southern Isyakis are never brought up into this part of the world unless the Isyakean king is on the verge of going to war with someone."   
  
"Let them come," Amethyst said with a bleak smile.   
  
"If it's all the same to you, I'd like to get our business attended to first. I've got to go to Sivu Isyak, and I'd prefer not to have to wade through whole armies of Isyaki to get there." The old man shook his head angrily. "What the hell's Tor thinking?" he burst out. "It's not time yet."   
  
Amethyst shrugged. "One time's as good as another."   
  
"Not for this war. Too many things have to happen first. Can't Aquamarine keep a leash on that maniac?"   
  
"Unpredictability is part of Tor Unalaq's unique charm," V observed sardonically. "He doesn't know himself what he's going to do from one day to the next."   
  
"You know the king of the Isyaki?" Jasper inquired.   
  
"We've met," V replied. "We're not fond of each other."   
  
"Myr and his crew should be gone by now," Mister Wolf said. "Let's move on. We've got a long way to go, and time's starting to catch up with us." He moved quickly toward his horse.   
  


\------------------------------------------------------

  
Shortly before sundown they went through a high pass lying in a notch between two mountains and stopped for the night in a little glen a few miles down on the far side.   
  
"Keep the fire down as much as you can, Bismuth," Mister Wolf warned the smith. "Southern Isyaki have sharp eyes and they can see the light from a fire from miles away. I'd rather not have company in the middle of the night."   
  
Bismuth nodded soberly and dug his firepit somewhat deeper than usual.   
  
Jasper was attentive to Princess Connie as they set up for the night, and Steven watched sourly. 

Though he had violently objected each time Aunt Pearl had insisted that he serve as Connie's personal attendant, now that the tiny girl had her knight to fetch and carry for her, Steven felt somehow that his rightful position had in some way been… usurped.   
  
"We're going to have to pick up our pace," Wolf told them after they had finished a meal of bacon, bread, and cheese. "We've gotta get through the mountains before the first storms hit, and we're going to have to try to stay ahead of Myr and his lapdogs." He scraped a space clear on the ground in front of him with one foot, picked up a stick and began sketching a map in the dirt. "We're here." He pointed. "Lanzalore’s directly ahead of us. We'll circle to the west, go through Tol Corale, and then strike northeast toward the Vale."   
  
"Seems easier to me if we just cut across Lanzalore," Jasper suggested, pointing at the crude map.   
  
"Perhaps," the old man replied, "but we won't do that unless we have to. Lanzalore’s haunted, and it's best to avoid it if possible."   
  
"We are not children to be frightened of goddamn ghosts," Jasper declared somewhat stiffly.   
  
"No one's doubting your courage, Jasper," Aunt Pearl told him, "but the spirit of Blue Diamond wails in Lanzalore. It's better not to offend her."   
  
"How far is it to the Vale of the Grey?" Bismuth asked.   
  
"Two hundred and fifty leagues," Wolf answered. "We'll be a month or more in the mountains, even under the best conditions. Now we'd better all get some sleep. Tomorrow's likely to be a hard day."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Small recap for those who haven't read my previous fics or have forgotten, Lanzalore, or the land of the Lazulean people, is Lapis's homeland, with Blue Diamond as their matron God.
> 
> It was destroyed, pillaged, raped and razed to the ground by the Shwar, Connie's people, for the promise of rich gold that lay buried in every riverbed in Lanzalore. As punishment, Blue Diamond cursed the land to forever be populated by the spirits of her slain people, driving the usurpers, or indeed anyone greedy enough to attempt to covet the gold of the Lazuli, mad. 
> 
> Blue Diamond herself, being the emotional wreck that she is, haunts the land, and any encounter with her is certain death, for reasons you'll very shortly see. 
> 
> (Short's a relative term, depending on how long I decide to burn this out)


	5. On Sanity's Edge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Backed into a corner by the threat of Isyaki pursuers, the Fellowship must make their toughest decision yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An old enemy makes a re-appearance here. One even older than Rohk-Nal-Do.

**WHEN THEY ROSE** the next morning as the first pale hint of light was appearing on the eastern horizon, there was a touch of silvery frost on the ground and a thin scum of ice around the edges of the spring at the bottom of the glen. Connie, who had gone to the spring to wash her face, lifted a leaf thin shard from the water and stared at it.   
  
"It's much colder up in the mountains," Steven told her as he belted on his sword.   
  
“Hmm. You don’t say," she replied loftily.   
  
"Forget it," he said shortly and stamped away, muttering.   
  
They rode down out of the mountains in the bright morning sunlight, moving at a steady trot. As they rounded a shoulder of outcropping rock, they saw the broad basin that had once been Lanzalore, the District of the Lazuli, stretching out below them. 

The meadows were a dusty autumn green, and the streams and lakes sparkled in the sun. A tumbled ruin, looking tiny in the distance, gleamed far out on the plain.   
  
Princess Connie, Steven noticed, kept her eyes averted, refusing even to turn in its direction.

  
Not far down the slope below them, a cluster of crude huts and lopsided tents lay in a steep gully where a frothy creek had cut down through the rocks and gravel. 

Dirt streets and paths wandered crookedly up and down the sides of the gully, and a dozen or so ragged-looking men were hacking somewhat dispiritedly at the creek bank with picks and mattocks, turning the water below the shabby settlement a muddy yellow brown.   
  
"A town?" Bismuth questioned. "Out here?"   
  
"Not exactly a town," Wolf replied. "The men in those settlements sift gravel and dig up the streambanks, looking for gold."   
  
"Is there gold here?" V asked quickly, her eyes bright.   
  
"A little," Wolf said. "Probably not enough to make it worth anyone's time to look for it."   
  
"Why do they bother, then?"   
  
Wolf shrugged. "Who knows?"   
  
Jasper and Amethyst took the lead, and they moved down the rocky trail toward the settlement. 

As they approached, two men came out of one of the huts with rusty swords in their hands. One, a thin, unshaven man with a high forehead, wore a greasy Shwarean jerkin. The other, much taller and bulkier, was dressed in the ragged tunic of an Flaxen serf.   
  
"That's far enough," the Shwarean shouted. "We don't let armed men come in here until we know what their business is."   
  
"You're blocking the trail, buddy," Amethyst advised him. "You might find that unhealthy."   
  
"One shout from me will bring fifty armed men," the Shwarean warned.   
  
"Don't be an idiot, Rando," the big Flaxen Flaxen told him. "That one with all the steel on him is a Gelarian knight. There aren't enough men on the whole mountain to stop him, if he decides to go through here." He looked warily at Jasper. "What're your intentions, Ser Knight?" he asked respectfully.   
  
"We are but following the trail," Jasper replied. "We have no interest in your little community."   
  
The Flaxman grunted. "That's good enough for me. Let them pass, Rando." He slid his sword back under his rope belt.   
  
"What if he's lying?" Rando retorted. "What if they're here to steal our gold?"   
  
"What gold, you jackass?" the Flaxen demanded with contempt. "There isn't enough gold in the whole camp to fill a thimble - and Gelarian knights don't lie. If you want to fight with him, go ahead. After it's over, we'll scoop up what's left of you and dump you in a hole someplace."   
  
"You've got a bad mouth, Barry," Rando observed darkly.   
  
"And what do you plan to do about it?"   
  
The Shwarean glared at the larger man and then turned and walked away, muttering curses.   
  
Barry laughed harshly, then turned back to Jasper. "Come ahead, Ser Knight," he invited. "Rando's all mouth. You don't have to worry about him."   
  
Jasper moved forward at a walk. "You're a long way from home, my friend."   
  
Barry shrugged. "There wasn't anything in Flaxia to keep me, and I had a misunderstanding with my lord over a pig. When he started talking about hanging, I thought I'd like to try my luck in a different country."   
  
"Fair enough." Amethyst laughed.   
  
Barry winked at her. "The trail goes right on down to the creek," he told them, "then up the other side behind those shacks. The men over there are Indratu, but the only one who might give you any trouble is Tarlok. He got drunk last night, though, so he's probably still sleeping it off."   
  
A vacant-eyed man in Delmarvian clothing shambled out of one of the tents. Suddenly he lifted his face and howled like a dog. Barry picked up a rock and shied it at him. The Delmar dodged the rock and ran yelping behind one of the shacks. 

 

"One of these days I'm going to do him a favor and stick a knife in him," Barry remarked sourly. "He bays at the moon all night long."   
  
"What's his problem?" Amethyst asked.   
  
Barry shrugged. "Crazy. He thought he could make a dash into Lanzalore and pick up some gold before the ghosts caught him. He was wrong."   
  
"What did they do to him?" Bismuth asked, his eyes wide.   
  
"Nobody knows," Barry replied. "Every so often somebody gets drunk or greedy and thinks he can get away with it. It wouldn't do any good, even if the ghosts didn't catch you. Anybody coming out is stripped immediately by his friends. Nobody gets to keep any gold he brings out, so why bother?"   
  
"You've got a charming society here," V observed wryly.   
  
Berig laughed. "It suits me. It's better than decorating a tree in my lord's apple orchard back in Flaxia." He scratched absently at one armpit. "I guess I'd better go do some digging," he sighed. "Good luck." He turned and started toward one of the tents.   
  
"Let's move along," Wolf said quietly. "These places tend to get rowdy as the day wears on."   
  
"You seem to know quite a bit about them, father," Aunt Pearl noticed.   
  
"They're good places to hide," he replied. "Nobody asks any questions. I've needed to hide a time or two in my life."   
  
"I wonder why?" she said dryly. 

 

\--------------------   
  
They started along the dusty street between the slapped-together shacks and patched tents, moving down toward the roiling creek. 

 

" **_Wait!_ ** " someone called from behind. A scruffy-looking Q’zarnian was running after them, waving a small leather pouch. He caught up with them, puffing. "Why didn't you wait?" he demanded.   
  
"What do you want?" V asked him.   
  
"I'll give you fifty pennyweight of fine gold for the girl," the Q’zarnian panted, waving his leather sack in Connie's direction.    
  
Jasper's face went bleak, and his hand moved toward his sword hilt.   
  
"Why don't you let me deal with this, Jasper?" V suggested mildly, swinging down from her saddle.   
  
Connie's expression had first registered shock, then outrage. She appeared almost on the verge of explosion before Steven reached her and put his hand on her arm. 

 

"Watch," he told her softly.   
  
" **_How dare-_ ** "   
  
"Hush. Just watch.V's going to take care of it."   
  
"That's a pretty paltry offer," V said, her fingers flicking idly.   
  
"She's still young," the other Q’zarnian pointed out. "She obviously hasn't had much training yet. Which one of you owns her?"   
  
"We'll get to that in a moment," V replied. "Surely you can make a better offer than that."   
  
"It's all I've got," the scruffy man answered plaintively, waving his fingers, "and I don't want to go into partnership with any of the brigands in this place. I'd never get to see any of the profits."   
  
V shook her head. "I'm sorry," she refused. "It's out of the question. I'm sure you can see our position."   
  
Connie was making strangled noises.   
  
"Be quiet," Steven snapped. "This isn't what it seems to be."   
  
"What about the older one?" the scruffy man suggested, sounding desperate. "Surely fifty pennyweight's a good price for her."   
  
Without warning, V's fist lashed out, and the scruffy Q’zarnian reeled back from the apparent blow. His hand flew to his mouth, now red with blood, and he began to spew curses.   
  
"Run him off, Jasper," V said quite casually.   
  
The grim-faced knight drew his broadsword and moved his warhorse deliberately at the swearing Q’zarnian. After one startled yelp, the man turned and fled.   
  
"What did he say?" Wolf asked V. "You were standing in front of him, so I couldn't see."   
  
"The whole region's alive with Isyakis," V replied, climbing back on her horse. "Kieran says that a dozen parties of them have been through here in the last week."   
  
"You knew that  **_animal?_ ** " Connie demanded.   
  
"Who, Kieran? Of course. We went to school together."   
  
"Q’zarnians like to keep an eye on things, Princess," Wolf told her. "King Vlad has agents everywhere."   
  
"That awful man is an agent of King Vladimar?" Connie asked incredulously.   
  
V nodded. "Actually Kieran's a gentleman," he said. "He has exquisite manners under normal circumstances. He asked me to convey his compliments."   
  
Connie looked baffled.   
  
"Q’zarnians talk to each other with their fingers. It's sort of like their mother tongue." Steven explained, casually. "I thought you’d know that, Princess.”   
  
Connie's eyes narrowed at him.   
  
"What Kieran actually said was, 'Tell the redhead wench that I apologize for the insult,' " Steven informed her smugly. "He needed to talk to V, and he had to have an excuse."   
  
" **_Wench?_ ** "   
  
"His words, not mine," Steven replied quickly.   
  
"You know this sign language?"   
  
"Naturally."   
  
"That's enough, Steven," Aunt Pearl said firmly.   
  
"Kieran recommends that we get out of here immediately,"V told Mister Wolf. "He says that the Isyakis are looking for somebody - us, probably."   
  
From the far side of the camp there were sudden angry voices. Several dozen Indratu boiled out of their shanties to confront a group of Isyaki horsemen who had just ridden up out of a deep gully. 

At the forefront of the Indraaks hulked a huge, fat man who looked more animal than human. In his right hand he carried a brutal-looking steel mace. 

 

**_"Marty!"_ ** he bellowed. "I told you I'd kill you next time you came here."   
  
The man who stepped out from among the Isyaki horses to face the hulking Indraak was Myr. 

 

"You've told me a lot of things, Tarlok," he shouted back.   
  
"This time you get what's coming to you, Marty," Tarlok roared, striding forward and swinging his mace.   
  
"Stay back," Myr warned, stepping away from the horses. "I don't have time for this right now."   
  
"You don't have any time left at all, Marty - for anything." Tarlok was grinning broadly. "Would anyone like to take this opportunity to say good-bye to our friend over there?" he said. "I think he's about to leave on a  **_very_ ** long journey."   
  
But Myr's right hand had dipped suddenly inside his tunic. 

With a flickering movement, he whipped out a peculiar-looking triangular steel object about six inches across. Then, in the same movement, he flipped it, spinning and whistling, directly at Tarlok. 

The flat steel triangle sailed, flashing in the sun as it spun, and disappeared with a sickening sound of shearing bone into the hulking Indraak's chest.

 

V hissed with amazement.   
  
Tarlok stared stupidly at Myr, his mouth agape and his left hand going to the spurting hole in his chest. Then his mace slid out of his right hand, his knees buckled, and he fell heavily forward with a resounding thud.    
  
"Let's get out of here!" Mister Wolf barked. "Down the creek! Go!"   
  
They plowed into the rocky streambed at a plunging gallop, and the muddy water sprayed out from under their horses' hooves. After several hundred yards they turned sharply to scramble up a steep gravel bank.   
  
"Through there!" Amethyst shouted, pointing toward more level ground. Steven did not have time to think, only to cling to his horse and try to keep up with the others. Faintly, far behind, he could hear shouts.   
  
They rode behind a low hill and reined in for a moment at Wolf's signal. "Ruby," the old man said, "see if they're coming."   
  
Ruby wheeled her horse and loped up to a stand of trees on the brow of the hill.   
  
V was muttering curses, her face livid.   
  
"What's your problem now?" Amethyst demanded.   
  
V kept on swearing.   
  
"What's got her so worked up?" Amethyst asked Mister Wolf.   
  
"Our friend's just had a nasty shock," the old man answered. "She misjudged somebody - so did I, as a matter of fact. That weapon Myr used on the big Indratu is called a shuriken."   
  
Amethyst shrugged. "It looked like just an odd-shaped throwing knife to me.   
  
"There's a bit more to it than that," Wolf told her. "It's as sharp as a razor on all three sides, and the points are usually dipped in poison. It's the special weapon of the Topazine. That's what has got V so upset."   
  
"I should have known," V berated herself. "Myr's been a little too good all along to be just an ordinary Delmarvian footpad."   
  
"Do you know what they're talking about, P?" Amethyst asked.   
  
"The Topazine is a secret society in Sivu Isyak," she told him. "They train killers-- assassins. They answer only to Aquamarine and their own elders. Aquamarine's been using them for centuries to eliminate people who get in her way. They're very efficient."   
  
"Topazine, Schmopazine. I've never cared much about Isyaki culture and I'm not gonna start now," Amethyst replied. "If they want to creep around and kill each other, so much the better." She glanced up the hill quickly to find out if Ruby had seen anything behind them. "That thing Myr used might be an interesting toy, but it's no match for armor and a good whip."   
  
"You're lucky you're a gem, cause that's a dangerous attitude to have,” V said, beginning to regain her composure. "A well-thrown shuriken can cut right through a mail shirt; if you know how, you can even sail it around corners. Not only that, a Topazite could kill you with just his hands and feet, whether you're wearing armor or not." He frowned. "You know, Greg," she mused, "we might have been making a mistake all along. We assumed that Rohk-Nal-Do was using Myr, but it might have been the other way around. Myr has to be good, or Aquamarine wouldn't have sent him into the West to keep an eye on us." She smiled then, a chillingly bleak little smile. "I wonder just how good he is." She flexed her fingers. "I've met a few Topazites, but never one of their best. That might be very interesting."   
  
"Let's not lose focus," Wolf told him. “The route to Tol Corale is obviously a no-go. Which means…” 

The old man's face was grim. He looked at Aunt Pearl, and something seemed to pass between them.   
  
"You're not serious," she said.   
  
"I don't think we've got much choice, Pearl. There are Isyaki all around us - too many and too close. I don't have any room to move; they've got us pinned right up against the southern edge of Lanzalore. Sooner or later, we're going to get pushed out onto the plain anyway. At least, if we make the decision ourselves, we'll be able to take some precautions."   
  
"Greg, if they don't kill us,  **_she_ ** surely will." she stated bluntly.   
  
"I know," he admitted, "but we've got to shake off all this heat or we'll never make it to the Vale before winter sets in."   
  
Ruby rode back down the hill. "They're coming," she reported quietly. "And there's another group of them circling in from the west to cut us off."   
  
Wolf drew in a deep breath. "I think that pretty well decides it, Pearl," he said. "Let's go."   
  


\---------------------------------------------------

  
As they passed into the belt of trees dotting the last low line of hills bordering the plain, Steven glanced back once. 

A half dozen dust clouds spotted the face of the miles-wide slope above them. Isyaki were converging on them from all over the mountains.   
  
They galloped on into the trees and thundered through a shallow draw. Amethyst, riding in the lead, suddenly held up her hand. 

 

"Dudes ahead of us," she warned.   
  
"Isyaki?" Ruby asked, her hand clenching up.    
  
"I don't think so," Amethyst replied. "The one I saw looked more like some of those we saw back at the settlement."   
  
V, her eyes bright, pushed her way to the front. "I've got an idea," she said. "Let me talk to them." She pushed her horse into a dead run, plunging directly into what seemed to be an ambush. "Comrades!" she shouted. "Get ready! They're coming - and they've got the gold!"   
  
Several shabby-looking men with rusty swords and axes rose from the bushes or stepped out from behind trees to surround the little woman.

V was talking very fast, gesticulating, waving her arms and pointing back toward the slope looming behind them.   
  
"What's she doing?" Amethyst asked.   
  
"Something devious, I imagine," Wolf replied.   
  
The men surrounding V looked dubious at first, but their expressions gradually changed as he continued to talk excitedly. Finally she turned in her saddle to look back. She jerked her arm in a broad, overhead sweep. 

 

"Let's go!" she shouted. "They're with us!" She spun her horse to scramble up the graveled side of the gully.   
  
"Don't get separated," Amethyst warned, shifting her shoulders under her mail shirt. "I'm not sure what she's up to, but these schemes of hers sometimes fall apart."   
  
They pounded down through the grim-looking brigands and up the side of the gully on V's heels.   
  
"What did you say to them?" Amethyst shouted as they rode.   
  
"I told them that fifteen Isyaki had made a dash into Lanzalore and come out with three heavy packs of gold." The little man laughed. "Then I said that the men at the settlement had turned them back and that they were trying to double around this way with the gold. I told them that we'd cover this next gully if they'd cover that one back there."   
  
"Those scoundrels will swarm all over Myr and his Isyaki when they try to come through," Amethyst grinned   
  
"I know." V laughed right back. "Terrible, isn't it?"   
  


\-------------------------------------------------------

  
They rode on at a gallop. After about a half mile, Mister Wolf raised his arm, and they all reined in. 

 

"This should be far enough," he told them. "Now listen very carefully, all of you. These hills are alive with Isyaki, so… I'm afraid we don't have a choice.”

 

Princess Connie, from her seat beside Aunt Pearl, shifted uneasily. She seemed to sense that something had changed. 

 

“Wait, what's happening? Why have we stopped, Lady Polina?”    
  
"It will be all right, dear," Aunt Pearl soothed her.

 

“We're going to have to go into Lanzalore.” said Wolf gravely.

 

At the mention of the name, Princess Connie went deathly pale.   
  
Wolf's face was grimly serious. "As soon as we ride out onto the plain, you're going to start hearing certain things," he continued. "It's of the utmost importance that you  **_don't listen to them_ ** . Just keep riding forward and don't pay any attention. I'm going to be in the lead and I want you all to watch me very closely. As soon as I raise my hand, I want you to stop and get down off your horses immediately. Keep your eyes on the ground and don't look up, no matter what you hear. There are things out there that you're better off not seeing. Pearl and I are going to put you all into a kind of sleep. Don't try to fight us. Just relax and do exactly what we tell you to do."   
  
"Sleep?" Jasper protested. "What if we are attacked? How may we defend ourselves if we are asleep?"   
  
"There isn't anything alive out there to attack you, Jasper," Wolf told him. "So it isn't your body that needs to be protected; it's your mind."   
  
"What about the horses?" Ruby asked.   
  
"The horses will be all right. They won't even see the ghosts."   
  
"I can't do it," Connie declared, her voice hovering on the edge of hysteria. " **_Please_ ** . Please don't make me go."   
  
"Yes, you can, dear," Aunt Pearl told her in that same calm, soothing voice. "Stay close to me. I won't let anything happen to you. I promise."   
  
Steven felt a sudden profound sympathy for the frightened little girl, and he drew his horse over beside hers. 

"I'll be here, too. I'll protect you." he told her. She looked at him gratefully, but her lower lip still trembled, and her face was very pale.   
  
Mister Wolf took a deep breath and glanced once at the long slope behind them. The dust clouds raised by the converging Isyaki were much closer now. 

"All right," he said, "let's go." He turned his horse and began to ride at an easy trot down toward the mouth of the gully and the plain stretching out before them.   
  


\---------------

  
The sound at first seemed faint and very far away, almost like the murmur of wind among the branches of a forest or the soft babble of water over stones. 

Then, as they rode farther out onto the plain, it grew louder and more distinct. Steven glanced back once, almost longingly at the hills behind them. 

Then he pulled his horse close in beside Connie's and locked his eyes on Mister Wolf's back, trying to close his ears.   
  
The sound was now a chorus of moaning cries punctuated by occasional shrieks that pierced the morning air. 

Behind it all, and seeming to carry and sustain all the other sounds, was a constant, dreadful wailing - a single voice surely, but so vast and all-encompassing that it seemed to reverberate inside Steven's head, erasing all thought.   
  
Mister Wolf suddenly raised his hand, and Steven slid out of his saddle, his eyes fixed almost desperately on the ground. Something was flickering at the edge of his vision, but he refused to look.   
  
Then Aunt Pearl was speaking to them, her voice uncharacteristically calm and reassuring. 

"I want you to form a circle," she told them, "and take each others' hands. Nothing will be able to enter the circle, so you'll all be safe."   
  
Trembling in spite of himself, Steven stretched out his hands. Someone took his left, he didn't know who; but he instantly knew that the tiny hand that clung so desperately to his right was Connie's.   
  
Aunt Pearl stood in the center of their circle, and Steven could feel the force of her presence there washing over all of them. Somewhere outside the circle, he could feel Wolf. The old man was doing something that swirled faint surges through Steven's veins and set off staccato bursts of the familiar roaring sound.   
  
The wailing of the dreadful, single voice grew louder, more intense, and Steven felt the first touches of panic. It was not going to work. They were all going to go mad.   
  
_ "Shtu-roll, let go. I've got you." _ Mister Wolf’s voice came to him, and he knew that he spoke inside his mind. His panic faded, and he felt a strange, peaceful lassitude. 

His eyes grew heavy, and the sound of the wailing grew fainter. Then, enfolded in a comforting warmth, he fell almost at once into a profound slumber.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor Connie. Her people have history with the Lazulites. This really isn't sitting well with her.


	6. Into Lanzalore

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On haunted ground, The Fellowship is placed under a spell of deep sleep for the sake of their sanity.
> 
> Resisting the spell, Steven finds himself at the center of the horror, but is strangely unaffected, as his mind has more important things to talk about.

**STEVEN WAS NOT** exactly sure when it was that his mind shook off Aunt Pearl’s soft compulsion to sink deeper and deeper into protective unawareness. It could not have been long. 

Falteringly, like someone rising slowly from the depths, he swam back up out of sleep to find himself moving stiffly, even woodenly, toward the horses with the others. 

When he glanced at them, he saw their faces were blank, even uncomprehending. He seemed to hear Aunt Pearl's whispered command to " _ sleep, sleep, sleep _ ," but it somehow lacked the power necessary to compel him to obey.   
  
There was to his consciousness, however, a subtle difference. Although his mind was awake, his emotions seemed not to be. He found himself looking at things with a calm, lucid detachment, uncluttered by those feelings which so often churned his thoughts into turmoil. 

He knew that in all probability he should tell Aunt Pearl that he was not asleep, but for some obscure reason he chose not to. 

In the absence of urgency, he let himself wonder through the far corners of his psyche.

Patiently, he began to sort through the notions and ideas surrounding that decision, trying to isolate the single thought which he knew must lie behind the choice not to speak. 

In his search, he touched that quiet corner where the other mind stayed. He could almost sense its sardonic amusement.   
  
" _ Well? _ " he said silently to it.   
  
" _ Hello, Starlight. I see that you're finally awake _ ," the other mind said to him. 

_ "No," _ Steven corrected rather meticulously, " _ actually a part of me is asleep, I think _ ."   
  
_ "You mean the part that kept getting in the way. Thank the stars that's over. We have some things to discuss." _   
  
_ "Who are you again? I feel like I should know you from somewhere." _ Steven asked, absently following Aunt Pearl's instructions to get back on his horse.   
  
_ "I don't actually have a name." _   
  
_ "You're separate from me, though, right? I mean, you're not just another part of me, are you?" _   
  
_ "No," _ the voice replied, " _ we're quite separate _ ."   
  
The horses were moving at a walk now, following Aunt Pearl and Mister Wolf across the open meadow. The flowers the grew here were strange. Each flower seemed touched, in a way, by the colour blue. 

 

Blue lavender, blue sunflowers. If Steven were awake, he probably would have thought it odd. Instead, he felt nothing. 

  
_ "What do you want?" _ Steven asked.   
  
_ "I need to make things come out the way they're supposed to. I've been doing that for a very long time now." _   
  
Steven considered that. Around him the wailing grew louder, and the chorus of moans and shrieks became more distinct. 

Filmy, half formed tatters of shape began to appear, floating across the grass toward the horses. 

 

_ "I'm going to go mad, aren't I?" _ he asked somewhat regretfully.  _ "I'm not asleep like the others are, and the ghosts will drive me mad, won't they?" _   
  
_ "I doubt it," _ the voice answered.  _ "You'll see some things you'd probably rather not see, but I don't think it will destroy your mind. You might even learn some things about yourself that will be useful later on." _ __   
  
“ _ You're very old, aren't you? _ " Steven asked as the thought occurred to him.   
  
" _ That term doesn't have any meaning in my case." _   
  
" _ Older than my grandfather?" _ Steven persisted.   
  
" _ I knew him when he was a child. It might make you feel better to know that he was even more stubborn than you are. It took me a very long time to get him started in the direction he was supposed to go." _   
  
" _ Did you do it from inside his mind? _ "   
  
" _ Naturally _ ."   
  
Steven noted that his horse was walking obliviously through one of the filmy images that was taking shape in front of him.  _ "Then he knows you, doesn't he - if you were in his mind, I mean?" _ __   
  
" __ He didn't know I was there. "   
  


“ _ So he doesn’t know you exist?” _

 

There was a pause then. “ _... Not exactly.” _

  
" _ I've always known you were there. _ "   
  
" _ You're different. That's what we need to talk about." _ __   
  
Rather suddenly, a woman's head appeared in the air directly in front of Steven's face. The eyes were bulging, and the mouth was agape in a soundless scream. The ragged, hacked-off stump of its neck streamed blood that seemed to dribble off into nowhere. 

**_"Kiss me,"_ ** it croaked at him. Steven stared blankly in a sort of morbid fascination as his face passed through the head.   
  
" _ You see, _ " the voice pointed out conversationally. " _ It's not as bad as you thought it was going to be. _ "   
  
" _ You were saying that I was different. How exactly _ ?" Steven wanted to know.   
  
" _ Something needs to be done, and you're the one who's going to do it. All the others have just been in preparation for you. _ "   
  
" _ What is it exactly that I have to do? _ "   
  
" _ I can’t tell you just yet. You'll know when the time comes. If you find out too soon, it might frighten you. _ " The voice took on a somewhat wry note. " _ You're difficult enough to manage without additional complications. _ "   
  
" _ Why are we talking about it then? _ "   
  
" _ You need to know why you have to do it. That might help you when the time comes. _ "   
  
" _ All right, _ " Steven agreed.   
  
" _ A very long time ago, something happened that wasn't supposed to happen, _ " the voice in his mind began. " _ The universe came into existence for a reason, and it was moving toward that purpose smoothly. Everything was happening the way it was supposed to happen, but then something went wrong. It wasn't really a very big thing, but it just happened to be in the right place at the right time - or perhaps in the wrong place at the wrong time might be a better way to put it. Anyway, it changed the direction of events. Can you understand that? _ "   
  
" _ I think so, _ " Steven replied, frowning with the effort. " _ Is it like when you throw a rock at something but it bounces off something else instead and goes where you don't want it to go - like the time Onion threw that rock at the crow and it hit a tree limb and bounced off and broke Alger’s window instead? _ "   
  
" _ Yes. Precisely. _ " the voice congratulated him. " _ Up to that point there had always been only one possibility - the original one. Now there were suddenly two. Let's take it one step further. If Onion-- or you had thrown another rock very quickly and hit the first rock before it got to Alger's window, it's possible that the first rock might have been knocked back to hit the crow instead of the window. _ "   
  
" _ Maybe _ ," Steven conceded doubtfully. " _ Onion wasn't really that good at throwing rocks. _ "   
  
" _ I'm much better at it than Onion, _ " the voice told him. " _ That's the whole reason I came into existence in the first place. In a very special way, you are the rock that I've thrown. If you hit the other rock just right, you'll turn it and make it go where it was originally intended to go.” _

  
" _ And if I don't? _ "   
  
" _ Alger’s window gets broken. _ "   
  
The figure of a naked blue-skinned woman with her arms chopped off and a sword thrust through her body appeared just then. She shrieked and moaned at him, and the stumps of her arms spurted blood directly into his face. 

Steven reached up to wipe off the blood, but his face was dry. Unconcerned, his horse walked through the gibbering ghost.   
  
" _ We have to get things back on the right course, _ " the voice went on. " _ This certain thing you have to do is the key to the whole business. For a long time, what was supposed to happen and what was actually happening went off in different directions. Now they're starting to converge again. The point where they meet is the point where you'll have to act. If you succeed, things will be all right again; if you don't, everything will keep going wrong, and the purpose for which the universe came into existence will fail. _ "   
  
" _ How long ago was it when this started? _ "   
  
" _ Before the world was made. Even before the Diamonds. _ "   
  
" _ Will I succeed? _ " Steven asked.   
  
_ "I don't know," _ the voice replied. " _ I know what's supposed to happen - not what will. There's something else you need to know too. When this mistake occurred, it set off two separate lines of possibility, and a line of possibility has a kind of purpose. To have a purpose, there has to be awareness of that purpose. To put it rather simply, that's what I am - the awareness of the original purpose of the universe. _ "   
  
" _ Only now there's another one, too, isn't there? _ " Steven suggested. " _ Another awareness, I mean - one connected with the other set of possibilities. _ "   
  
" _ You're even brighter than I thought. _ "   
  
" _ And wouldn't it want things to keep going wrong? _ "   
  
" _ I'm afraid so. Now we come to the important part. The spot in time where all this is going to be decided one way or another is getting very close, and you've got to be ready. _ "   
  
" _ Why me? _ " Steven asked, brushing away a disconnected hand that appeared to be trying to clutch at his throat. " _ Can't somebody else do it? _ "   
  
" _ No, _ " the voice told him. " _ That's not the way it works. The universe has been waiting for you for more millions of years than you could even imagine. You've been hurtling toward this event since before the beginning of time. It's yours alone. You're the only one who can do what needs to be done, and it's the most important thing that will ever happen - not just in this world but in all the worlds in all the universe. There are whole races of men on worlds so far away that the light from their suns will never reach this world, and they'll cease to exist if you fail. They'll never know you or thank you, but their entire existence depends on you. The other line of possibility leads to absolute chaos and the ultimate destruction of the universe, but you and I lead to something else. _ "   
  
" _ What? _ "   
  
" _ If you're successful, you'll live to see it happen. _ "   
  
_ "All right," _ Steven said. " _ What do I have to do - now, I mean? _ "   
  
" _ You have enormous power. It's been given to you so that you can do what you have to do, but you've got to learn how to use it. Greg and your Aunt Pearl are trying to help you learn, so stop fighting with them about it. You've got to be ready when the time comes, and the time is much closer than you might think. _ "   
  


———————————————

  
A decapitated figure stood in the trail, holding its head by the hair with its right hand. As Steven approached, he noticed once again that its skin was a distinct hue of blue.

  
After he had ridden through the ghost, Steven tried to speak to the mind within his mind again, but it seemed to be gone for the moment. They rode slowly past the tumbled stones of a ruined farmstead.   
  
Ghosts clustered thickly on the stones, beckoning and calling seductively.   
  
"A disproportionate number seem to be women," Aunt Pearl observed calmly to Mister Wolf.   
  
"It was a peculiarity of the race," Wolf replied. "Eight out of nine births were female. It made certain...  **_adjustments_ ** necessary in the customary relationships between men and women."   
  
"I imagine you found that entertaining," she said dryly.   
  
"The Lazulites didn't look at things precisely the way other races do. Marriage never gained much status among them. They were quite liberal about certain things."   
  
"Oh? Is  **_that_ ** the term for it?"   
  
"Oh, grow up, and get off my case, Pearl. The society functioned; that's what counts."   
  
"There's a bit more to it than that, Greg," she said. "What about their cannibalism?"   
  
"Oh…  **_that_ ** . That was a mistake. Somebody misinterpreted a passage in one of their sacred texts, that's all. They did it out of a sense of religious obligation, not out of appetite. On the whole, I rather liked the Lazulites. They were generous, friendly, and very honest with each other. They  **_enjoyed_ ** life. If it hadn't been for the gold here, they'd probably have worked out their little aberration."   
  
Steven had forgotten about the gold. As they crossed a small stream, he looked down into the sparkling water and saw the butter-yellow flecks glittering among the pebbles on the bottom.   
  
A naked ghost suddenly appeared before him. "Don't you think I'm beautiful?" she leered. Then she took hold of the sides of the great slash that ran up her abdomen, pulled it open and spilled out her entrails in a pile on the bank of the stream.   
  
Steven gagged and clenched his teeth together.   
  
" _ Don't think about the gold! _ " the voice in his mind said sharply. " _ The ghosts come at you through your greed. If you think about gold, you'll go mad. _ "   
  
They rode on, and Steven tried to push the thought of gold out of his mind.   
  


——————

  
Mister Wolf, however, continued to talk about it. "That's always been the problem with gold. It seems to attract the worst kind of people - the Shwar in this case."   
  
"They were trying to stamp out cannibalism, father," Aunt Pearl replied. "That's a custom most people find repugnant."   
  
"Oh,  **_sure_ ** they were, Pearl. I wonder how serious they'd have been about it if all that gold hadn't been lying on the bed of every stream in Lanzalore."   
  
Aunt Pearl averted her eyes from the ghost of a child impaled on a Shwarean spear. "And now no one has the gold," she said. "Blue saw to that."   
  
"Yes," Wolf agreed, lifting his face to listen to the dreadful wail that seemed to come from everywhere. He winced at a particularly shrill note in the wailing. "I wish she wouldn't scream so loud."   
  


“You can’t blame her though,” Aunt Pearl murmured softly. “She lost everything.”

 

“She has to move on.”

  
They passed the ruins of what appeared to have been a temple. The white stones were tumbled, and grass grew up among them. A broad tree standing nearby was festooned with hanging bodies, twisting and swinging on their ropes. Their hands were tied behind their backs and they were wriggling grotesquely as they swung from their necks.

 

"Let us down," the bodies pleaded. "Let us down."   
  
"Greg!" Aunt Pearl said sharply, pointing at the meadow beyond the fallen temple. "Over there! Those people are real."   
  
A procession of robed and hooded figures moved slowly through the meadow, chanting in unison to the sound of a mournfully tolling bell supported on a heavy pole they carried on their shoulders.   
  
"The monks of La Zellan," Wolf said. "Shwar’s conscience. They aren't anything to worry about."   
  
One of the hooded figures looked up and saw them. " **_Go back!_ ** " he shouted. He broke away from the others and ran toward them, recoiling often from things Steven could not see. " **_Go back!_ ** " he cried again. " **_Save yourselves!_ ** You approach the very center of the horror. La Zuli lies just beyond that hill.  **_Blue herself_ ** rages through its haunted streets!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was vacillating back and forth with the idea that both the cluster and Lapis Lazuli were trapped in their own gems for most of the duration of their existence.
> 
> This is my impression of the madness within the mirror.
> 
> More to come.


	7. The Mouth Of Madness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steven met a Diamond once, and she was understanding. This time he might not be so lucky...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pay attention now, dear reader. This chapter does more to explain the general idea of their journey than the rest of the two volumes combined.
> 
> Also, there are names mentioned here that hint as to the identities of the denizens of the home of Grey's disciples, The Grey Vale.

**THE PROCESSION OF** monks moved on, the sound of their chanting and slowly tolling bell growing fainter as they crossed the meadow. Mister Wolf seemed deep in thought, the fingers of his good hand stroking his beard. Finally he sighed rather wryly.

 

"I suppose we might as well deal with her here and now, Pearl. She'll just follow us if we don't."  
  
"You're wasting your time, Greg," Aunt Pearl replied. "There's no way to reason with her. How is this going to be any different than the thousands of times we've tried before?"   
  
"You're probably right," he agreed, "but we should try at least. Our Diamond would be disappointed if we didn't. Maybe when she finds out what's happening, she'll come around to the point where we can at least talk to her."   
  
A piercing wail echoed across the sunny meadow, and Mister Wolf's face grew exasperated.

"You'd think that she'd have shrieked herself out by now. All right, let's go to La Zuli." He turned his horse toward the hill the wild-eyed monk had pointed out to them. A maimed ghost gibbered at him from the air in front of his face.

"Will you stop that!" he said irritably.

With a startled flicker, the ghost disappeared.  


\------------------

  
There had perhaps been a road leading over the hill at some time in the past. The faint track of it was dimly visible through the grass, but the thirty-two centuries which had passed since the last living foot had touched its surface had all but erased it.

They wound to the top of the hill and looked down into the ruins of La Zuli. Steven, still detached and unmoved, perceived and deduced things about the city he would not have otherwise noted.

Though the destruction had been nearly total, the shape of the city was clearly evident. The street - for there was only one - was laid out in a spiral, winding in toward a broad, circular plaza in the precise center of the ruins. With a peculiar flash of insight, Steven became immediately convinced that the city had been designed by a woman. Men's minds ran to straight lines, but women thought more in terms of circles.  
  
With Aunt Pearl and Mister Wolf in the lead and the rest following in wooden-faced unconsciousness, they started down the hill to the city.

Steven rode at the rear, trying to ignore the ghosts rising from the earth to confront him with their nudity and their hideous maiming. The wailing sound which they had heard from the moment they had entered Lanzalore grew louder, more distinct.

 

The wail had sometimes seemed to be a chorus, confused and distorted by echoes, but now Steven realized that it was one single, mighty voice, filled with a grief so vast that it reverberated through all the kingdom.  
  
As they approached the city, a terrible wind seemed to come up, deadly chill and filled with an overpowering, rank stench.

As Steven reached automatically to draw his cloak tighter about him, he saw that the cloak did not in any way react to that wind, and that the tall grass through which they rode did not bend before it.

He considered it, turning it over in his mind as he tried to close his nostrils to the putrid stench of decay and corruption carried on that ghostly wind. If the wind did not move the grass, it could not be a real wind.

Furthermore, if the horses could not hear the wails, they could not be real wails either. He grew colder and he shivered, even as he told himself that the chill - like the wind and the grief laden howling - was spiritual rather than real.  
  
Although La Zuli, when he had first glimpsed it from the top of the hill, had appeared to be in total ruin, when they entered the city Steven was startled to see the substantial walls of houses and public buildings surrounding him; and somewhere not far away he seemed to hear the sound of laughing children. There was also the sound of singing off in the distance.   
  
"Why does she keep doing this?" Aunt Pearl asked sadly. "It doesn't do any good."   
  
"It's all she has, Pearl," Mister Wolf replied.   
  
"It always ends the same way, though."   
  
"I know, but for a little while it helps her forget."   
  
"There are things we'd all like to forget. This isn't the way to do it."   
  
Wolf looked admiringly at the substantial-seeming houses around them. “Her memory is astonishing. Even after all these centuries."   
  
"Naturally," she said. "She’s a Diamond, after all, but it's still not good for her."   
  
It was not until Amy's horse inadvertently stepped directly through one of the walls - disappearing through the solid-looking stone and then re-emerging several yards farther down the street - that Steven understood what his Aunt and grandfather were talking about.

The walls, the buildings, the whole city was an illusion - a memory. The chill wind with its stink of corruption seemed to grow stronger and carried with it now the added reek of smoke.

Though Steven could still see the sunlight shining brightly on the grass, it seemed for some reason that it was growing noticeably darker. The laughter of children and the distant singing faded; replaced instead, by screams.  
  
A Shwarean legionnaire in burnished breastplate and plumed helmet, as solid-looking as the walls around them, came running down the long curve of the street. His sword soaked with blood, his face was fixed in a hideous caricature of a grin, and his eyes were wild.

In the street adjacent to them, he saw a young blue-haired woman being ripped from the arms of her lover and dragged into a smoldering house by two sneering legionnaires. Her piercing screams of the horrors she was to endure was only punctuated by the wet, hacking sounds of swords plunging into the man's body as he struggled weakly against the ropes that bound him.   


Hacked and mutilated bodies sprawled in the street now, and there was blood everywhere. The waiting climbed into a piercing shriek as the illusion moved on toward its dreadful climax.  
  
The spiral street opened at last into the broad circular plaza at the center of La Zuli. The icy wind seemed to howl through the burning city, and the dreadful sound of swords chopping through flesh and bone seemed to fill Steven's entire mind. The air grew even darker.   
  
The stones of the plaza were thick with the illusory memory of uncounted scores of Lazulean dead lying beneath rolling clouds of dense smoke.

But what stood in the center of the plaza was not an illusion, nor even a ghost. The figure towered and seemed to shimmer with a terrible presence, a reality that was in no way dependent upon the mind of the observer for its existence.

In its arms it held the body of a slaughtered child that seemed somehow to be the sum and total of all the dead of haunted Lanzalore; and its face, lifted in anguish above the body of that dead child, was ravaged by an expression of inhuman grief. The figure wailed horribly; and Steven, even in the half somnolent state that protected his sanity, felt the hair on the back of his neck trying to rise in horror.  
  
Mister Wolf grimaced and climbed down from his saddle. Carefully stepping over the illusions of bodies littering the plaza, he approached the enormous presence.

 

"Blue Diamond," he said, respectfully bowing to the figure.  
  
Blue howled.   
  
"Blue Diamond," Wolf said again. "I would not lightly intrude upon your mourning, but it is of the utmost importance that we speak."   
  
The dreadful face contorted, and great tears streamed like rivers down the God's cheeks. Wordlessly, Blue held out the body of the child and lifted her face and wailed.   
  
"Blue Diamond!" Wolf tried once again, more insistent this time.   
  
Blue closed her eyes and bowed her head, sobbing over the body of the child.   
  
"It's useless, father," Aunt Pearl told the old man. "When she's like this, you can't reach her."   
  
" **_Leave me be, Greg,_ ** " Blue said, still weeping. Her huge voice rolled and throbbed in Steven's mind, echoing as though she were speaking in a cave. " **_Leave me to my grief."_ **   
  
"Lady Blue, the day of the fulfillment of the prophecy is at hand," Wolf told her.   
  
**_"What is that to me?"_ ** Blue sobbed, clutching the body of the child closer. **_"Will the prophecy restore my slaughtered children to me? I am beyond its reach. Leave me alone."_ **   
  
"The fate of the world hinges upon the outcome of events which will happen very soon, my Diamond," Mister Wolf insisted. "The kingdoms of East and West are preparing for the last war, and White, your accursed sister, stirs in her slumber and will soon awaken."   
  
" **_Let her awaken,_ ** " Blue replied and bowed down over the body in her arms as a storm of fresh weeping swept over her.   
  
"Will you submit to her dominion then, My Diamond?" Aunt Pearl asked her.   
  
" **_I am beyond her dominion, Pearl_ ** ," Blue answered. " **_I will not leave this land of my murdered children, and no man or Sister of Mine will intrude upon me here. Let White have the world if she wants it. It holds no joy for me anymore."_ **   
  
"We might as well leave, father," Aunt Pearl said. "Nothing's going to move her."   
  
"Lady Blue," Mister Wolf said to the weeping God, "we have brought before ye the instruments of the prophecy. Will you bless them before we go?"   
  
**_"My blessings died with my children, Greg,"_ ** Blue spat. **_"I have only curses for the savage children of my orange harlot of a sister. Take these strangers and go."_ **   
  
"Lady Blue," Aunt Pearl said firmly, "a part is reserved for you in the working-out of the prophecy. The iron destiny which compels us all compels you as well. Each must play that part laid out for him from the beginning of days, for in the day that the prophecy is turned aside from its terrible course, the world will be unmade."   
  
" **_Let it be unmade_ ** ," Blue hissed. **_"It holds no more joy for me, so let it perish. My grief is eternal, and I will not abandon it, though the cost be the unmaking of all that has been made. Take these children of the prophecy and depart."_ **   
  
Mister Wolf bowed with resignation, turned, and came back toward the rest of them. His expression registered a certain hopeless disgust.   
  
**_"Wait!"_ ** Blue roared suddenly. The images of the city and its dead wavered and shimmered away. **_"What is this?"_ ** the God demanded.   
  
Mister Wolf turned quickly.   
  
**_"What have you done, Gregarion?"_ ** Blue accused, suddenly towering into immensity. " **_And you, Polina. Do you find my pain amusing? Will you cast my sorrow into my teeth?_ ** "   
  
"My Diamond?" Aunt Pearl seemed taken aback by the God's sudden fury.   
  
" **_Monstrous!_ ** " Blue roared. " **_Monstrous!"_ ** Her huge face convulsed with rage. In terrible anger, she strode toward them, her blue and then stopped directly in front of the horse of Princess Connie.

 

" **_I will strip the flesh from your bones!"_ ** she shrieked at her. " **_I will fill your brain with the worms of madness, daughter of Shwar. I will sink you in torment and horror for all the days of your worthless life."_ **   
  
" **_Leave her alone!_ ** " Aunt Pearl said sharply.   
  
" **_No, Polina,_ ** " she raged. " **_Upon her will fall the brunt of my wrath."_ ** Her dreadful, clutching fingers reached out toward the uncomprehending princess, but she stared blankly through her, unflinching and unaware.   
  
The God growled with frustration and whirled to confront Mister Wolf. " **_Tricked!"_ ** she howled. " **_Her mind is asleep_ ** ."   
  
"They're all asleep, Blue," Wolf replied. "Threats and horrors don't mean anything to them. Shriek and howl until the sky falls down; she cannot hear you."   
  
" **_I will punish you for this, Greg,"_ ** snarled Blue in rage, **_"and Pearl as well. You will all taste pain and terror for this arrogance in spite of me. I will wring the sleep from the minds of these intruders, and they will know the agony and madness I will visit upon them all."_ ** She swelled suddenly into vastness.   
  
"That's enough! Blue! Stop!" The voice was Steven's, but Steven knew that it was not he who spoke.   
  
The Spirit of Blue Diamond turned on him, raising her vast arm to strike, but Steven felt himself slide from his horse to approach the vast threatening figure.

"Your vengeance stops here, Blue," the voice coming from Steven's mouth said. "The girl is bound to **_my_ ** purpose. **_You will not touch her._ ** " Steven realized with a certain alarm that he had been placed between the raging God and the sleeping princess.   
  
**_"Move out of my way, child, if you value your continued existence,"_ ** Blue threatened.   
  
"Use your mind, you weeping whelp," the voice told him, "if you haven't howled it empty by now. You know who I am."   
  
**_"I will have her!"_ ** Blue howled. **_"I will give her a multitude of lives and tear each one from her quivering flesh."_ **   
  
"No," the voice replied, " **_you won't._ ** "   
  
The monolithic Blue Diamond drew herself up again, raising her dreadful arms; but at the same time, her eyes were probing - and more than her eyes.

Steven once again felt a vast touch on his mind as he had in Queen Holly’s throne room when the Spirit of Green Diamond had touched him.

 

A dreadful recognition began to dawn in Blue's weeping eyes as she realised the truth of his identity. Her raised arms fell as she sank to her knees.

 **_"Give her to me,"_ ** she pleaded. **_"Take the others and go, but give the Shwarean to me. I beg you."_ **   
  
**_"No."_ **

 

What happened then was not sorcery - Steven knew it instantly. The noise was not there nor that strange, rushing surge that always accompanied sorcery.

Instead, there seemed to be a terrible pressure as the full force of Blue Diamond’s will was directed crushingly at him. Steven could barely begin to resist such immensity, but then, the mind within his mind responded.

The power within was so vast that the world itself was not large enough to contain it, or indeed, the universe. It did not strike back at Blue, for that dreadful collision would have shattered the world, but it stood rather, calmly unmoved and immovable against the raging torrent of Blue's fury.

For a fleeting moment, Steven shared the awareness of the mind within his mind, and he shuddered back from its power. In that instant, he saw the birth of uncounted suns swirling in vast spirals against the velvet blackness of the void, their birth and gathering into galaxies and ponderously turning nebulae encompassing but a moment. And beyond that, he looked full in the face of time itself - seeing its beginning and its ending in one terrifying moment.  
  
Blue fell back.

 **_"I must submit,"_ ** she said hoarsely, and then she bowed to Steven, her tear-streaked face strangely humble. She turned away and buried her face in her hands, weeping uncontrollably.   
  
"Your grief will end, oh Diamond mine," the voice said gently. "One day you will find joy again."   
  
**_"Never,"_ ** the God sobbed. **_"My grief will last forever."_ **   
  
"Forever is a very long time, Blue," the voice replied, "and only **_I_ ** can see to the end of it."   
  
The weeping God did not answer, but moved away from them, and the sound of her wailing echoed once again through the ruins of La Zuli.

 

\-----------------------------------------------------

 

Mister Wolf and Aunt Pearl were both staring at Steven with stunned faces. When the old man spoke, his voice was awed.

 

"Is it possible?"  
  
"Aren't you the one who keeps saying that anything is possible, Greg?"   
  
"We didn't know you could intervene directly," Aunt Pearl said.   
  
"I nudge things a bit from time to time - make a few suggestions. If you think back carefully, you might even remember some of them."   
  
"Is the boy aware of any of this?" she asked.   
  
"Of course. We had a little talk about it."   
  
"How much did you tell him?"   
  
"As much as he could understand. Don't worry, Pearl, I'm not going to hurt him. He realizes how important all this is now. He knows that he needs to prepare himself and that he doesn't have a great deal of time for it. I think you'd better leave here now. The Shwarean girl's presence is causing Blue a great deal of pain."   
  
Aunt Pearl looked as if she wanted to say more, but she glanced once at the shadowy figure of the God weeping not far away and nodded. She turned to her horse and led the way out of the ruins.   
  
Mister Wolf fell in beside Steven after they had remounted to follow her.

 

"Erm… perhaps we could talk as we ride along," he suggested. "I have a great many questions."  
  
"He's gone, Grandfather," Steven told him.   
  
"Oh," Wolf answered with obvious disappointment.   
  
It was nearing sundown by then, and they stopped for the night in a grove about a mile away from La Zuli.

Since they had left the ruins, they had seen no more of the maimed ghosts. After the others had been fed and sent to their blankets, Aunt Pearl, Steven, and Mister Wolf sat around their small fire.

Since the presence in his mind had left him, following the meeting with Blue, Steven had felt himself sinking deeper toward sleep. All emotion was totally gone now, and he seemed no longer able to think independently.  
  
"Can we talk to the - other one?" Mister Wolf asked hopefully.   
  
"He isn't there right now," Steven replied.   
  
"Then he isn't always with you?"   
  
"Not always. Sometimes he goes away for months - sometimes even longer. He's been there for quite a long while this time - ever since Bloodstone burned up."   
  
"Where exactly is he when he's with you?" the old man asked curiously.   
  
"In here." Steven tapped his head.   
  
"Have you been awake ever since we entered Lanzalore?" Aunt Pearl asked.   
  
"Not exactly **_awake,_ ** " Steven answered. "Part of me was asleep."   
  
"You could see the ghosts?"   
  
"Yes."   
  
"But they didn't frighten you?"   
  
"No. Some of them surprised me, and one of them made me sick."   
  
Wolf looked up quickly. "It wouldn't make you sick **_now_ ** though, would it?"   
  
"No. I don't think so. Right at first I could still feel things like that a little bit. Now I can't."   
  
Wolf looked thoughtfully at the fire as if looking for a way to phrase his next question. "What did the other one in your head say to you when you talked together?"   
  
"He told me that something had happened a long time ago that wasn't supposed to happen and that I was supposed to fix it."   
  
Wolf laughed shortly. "That's a succinct way of putting it," he observed. "Did he say anything about how it was going to turn out?"   
  
"He doesn't know."   
  
Wolf sighed. "I'd hoped that maybe we'd picked up an advantage somewhere, but I guess not. It looks like both prophecies are still equally valid."   
  
Aunt Pearl was looking steadily at Steven. "Do you think you'll be able to remember any of this when you wake up again?" she asked.   
  
"I think so."   
  
"All right then, listen carefully. There are two prophecies, both leading toward the same event. The Mareks and the rest of the Alabastian are following one; we're following the other. The **_event_ ** turns out differently at the end of each prophecy."   
  
"I see."   
  
"Nothing in either prophecy excludes anything that will happen in the other until they meet in that event," she continued. "The course of everything that follows will be decided by how that event turns out. One prophecy will succeed; the other will fail. Everything that **_has happened_ ** and **_will happen_ ** comes together at that point and becomes one. The mistake will be erased, and the universe will go in one direction or the other, as if that were the direction it had been going from its very beginning. The only real difference is that something that's very important will never happen if we fail."   
  
Steven nodded, feeling suddenly very tired.   
  
"Paddy called it the theory of convergent destinies," Mister Wolf said. "Two equally possible possibilities. She can be so very convoluted sometimes."   
  
"It's not an uncommon failing, Greg," Aunt Pearl told him.   
  
"I think I'd like to sleep now," Steven said.   
  
Wolf and Aunt Pearl exchanged a quick glance. "All right," Aunt Pearl said. She rose and took him by the arm and led him to his blankets.   
  
After she had covered him, drawing the blankets up snugly, she laid one cool hand on his forehead. "Sleep, my Starlight," she murmured.   
  
And he did just that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Blue's a mess. It took me a while, but after a few touch ups I think I'm finally satisfied with the way she turned out. Destroyed utterly, by grief and loss. 
> 
> But what's that you say? No Lapis? That's right. No Lapis. Good things come to those who wait, oh reader mine, and you're going to have a to wait a little longer.


	8. The Calm After The Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Blue Diamond and Lanzalore behind them, the Fellowship focus on making it to the Vale. But time isn't on their side, as deadlier foes than she make their re-appearance...

**THEY WERE ALL** standing in a circle with their hands joined when they awoke. Connie was holding Steven's left hand, and Bismuth was on his right. Steven's awareness came flooding back as sleep left him.

The breeze was fresh and cool, and the morning sun was very bright. Yellow-brown foothills rose directly in front of them and the haunted plain of Lanzalore lay behind.  
  
V looked around sharply as she awoke, her eyes wary and alert.

 

"Where are we?" she asked quickly.  
  
"On the northern edge of Lanzalore," Wolf told her, "about eighty leagues east of Tol Corale."   
  
"How long were we asleep?"   
  
"A week or so."   
  
V kept looking around, adjusting her mind to the passage of time and distance. "I guess it was necessary," she conceded finally.   
  
Ruby went immediately to check the horses, and Amethyst began massaging the back of her neck with both hands.

 

"I feel like I've been sleeping on a pile of rocks," she complained.  
  
“You should've felt right at home, then," joked V. “You’ve slept in those for longer.”   
  
Connie, who was still in the process of acclimatising, had not removed her hand from Steven's, and he wondered if he should mention it to her. Her hand felt very warm and small in his and, on the whole, it was not unpleasant. He decided not to say anything about it.

  
Ruby was frowning when she came back. "One of the pack mares is with foal, Greg," she said.   
  
"How long has she got to go?" Wolf asked, looking quickly at her.   
  
"It's hard to say for sure - no more than a month. It's her first."   
  
"We can break down her pack and distribute the weight among the other horses," Bismuth suggested. "She'll be all right if she doesn't have to carry anything."   
  
"Maybe." Ruby sounded dubious.   
  
Jasper had been studying the yellowed foothills directly ahead.

 

"We are being watched, Gregarion," he said somberly, pointing at several wispy columns of smoke rising toward the blue morning sky.  
  
Mister Wolf squinted at the smoke and made a sour face. "Goldhunters, probably. They hover around the borders of Lanzalore like vultures over a sick cow. Take a look, Pearl."   
  
But Aunt Pearl's eyes already had that distant look in them as she scanned the foothills ahead.

 

"Flaxen," she said, "Delmars, Shwareans, a couple of Q’zarnians. They aren't very bright."  
  
"Any Isyaki?"   
  
"No."   
  
"Common rabble then," Jasper observed. "Such scavengers will not impede us significantly."   
  
"I'd like to avoid a fight if possible," Wolf told him. "These incidental skirmishes are dangerous and don't really accomplish anything." He shook his head with disgust. "We'll never be able to convince them that we're not carrying gold out of Lanzalore, though, so I guess there's no help for it."   
  
"If gold's all they want, why don't we just give them some?" V suggested.   
  
"I didn't bring all that much with me, V," the old man replied.   
  
"It doesn't have to be **_real,_ **" V said, her eyes twinkling. She went to one of the packhorses, came back with several large pieces of canvas, and quickly cut them into foot-wide squares.

Then she took one of the squares and laid a double handful of gravel in its center. She pulled up the corners and wrapped a stout piece of cord around them, forming a heavy-looking pouch. She hefted it a few times.

"Looks about like a sackful of gold, wouldn't you say?"  
  
"Why do I even bother warning you," Amethyst sighed.   
  
V smirked at her and quickly made up several more pouches.

"I'll take the lead," she said, hanging the pouches on their saddles. "Just follow me and let me do the talking. How many of them are up there, Polina?"  
  
"About twenty," she replied.   
  
"That will work out just fine," she stated confidently. "Shall we go?" They mounted their horses and started across the ground toward the broad mouth of a dry wash that opened out onto the plain.

V rode at the forefont, her eyes everywhere. As they entered the mouth of the wash, Steven heard a shrill whistle and saw several furtive movements ahead of them. He was very conscious of the steep banks of the wash on either side of them.  
  
"I'm going to need a bit of open ground to work with," V told them. "There." She pointed with her chin at a spot where the slope of the bank was a bit more gradual.

When they reached the spot, she turned his horse sharply. "Now!" she barked. " **_Ride!_ ** "   
  
They followed her, scrambling up the bank and kicking up a great deal of gravel; a thick cloud of choking yellow dust rose in the air as they clawed their way up out of the wash.   
  
Shouts of dismay came from the scrubby thorn bushes at the upper end of the wash, and a group of rough-looking men broke out into the open, running hard up through the knee-high brown grass to cut them off.

A black-bearded man, closer and more desperate than the rest, jumped out in front of them, brandishing a rust-pitted sword. Without hesitation, Jasper rode him down. The black-bearded man howled as he rolled and tumbled beneath the churning hooves of the huge warhorse.  
  
When they reached the hilltop above the wash, they gathered in a tight group. "This will do," V said, looking around at the rounded terrain. "All I need is for the mob to have enough room to think about casualties. I definitely want them to be thinking about casualties."   
  
An arrow buzzed toward them, and Jasper brushed it almost contemptuously out of the air with his helm.   
  
"Stop!" one of the brigands shouted. He was a lean, pockmarked Delmar with a crude bandage wrapped around one leg, wearing a dirty green tunic.   
  
"Who says so?" V yelled back insolently.   
  
"Kroldor," the bandaged man announced importantly. "Kroldor the raider. You've probably heard of me."   
  
"Can't say that I have," V replied pleasantly.   
  
"Leave your gold - **_and_ ** your women," Kroldor ordered. "Maybe I'll let you live."   
  
"I'm out of your league, hotshot. If you get out of our way, maybe we'll let **_you_ ** live."   
  
"I've got fifty men," Kroldor threatened, "all desperate, like me."   
  
"You've got twenty," V corrected. "Runaway serfs, cowardly peasants, and sneak thieves. My men are trained warriors. Not only that, we're **_mounted_ ** , and you're on foot."   
  
" **_Leave your gold_ ** ," the self proclaimed robber insisted.   
  
"So it's just **_gold_ ** , now, is it? Whatever happened to women? Make up your mind, street rat."   
  
"Let's go!" Kroldor barked at his men. He lunged forward. A couple of his outlaws rather hesitantly followed him through the brown grass, but the rest hung back, eyeing Jasper, Amethyst, and Ruby apprehensively. After a few paces, Kroldor realized that his men were not with him. He stopped and spun around. "You cowards!" he raged. "If we don't hurry, the others will get here. We won't get any of the gold."   
  
"I'll tell you what, Kroldor," V said. "We're in kind of a hurry, and we've got more gold than we can conveniently carry." She unslung one of her bags of gravel from her saddle and shook it suggestively. "Here." Negligently she tossed the bag into the grass off to one side. Then she took another bag and tossed it over beside the first. At her quick gesture the others all threw their bags on the growing heap. "There you are, Kroldor," V continued. "Ten bags of good yellow gold that you can have without a fight. If you want more, you'll have to bleed for it."   
  
The rough-looking men behind Kroldor looked at each other and began moving to either side, their eyes fixed greedily on the heap of bags lying in the tall grass.   
  
"Your men are having thoughts about mortality, Kroldor," V said dryly. "There's enough gold there to make them all rich, and rich men don't take unnecessary risks."   
  
Kroldor glared at him. "I won't forget this," he growled.   
  
"I'm sure you won't," V replied. "We're coming through now. I suggest that you get out of our way."   
  
Amethyst and Ruby moved up to flank Jasper, and the three of them started deliberately forward at a slow, menacing walk.   
  
Kroldor the robber stood his ground until the last moment, then turned and scurried out of their path, spouting curses.   
  
"Let's go," V snapped.   
  
They thumped their heels to their horses' flanks and charged through at a gallop. Behind them, the outlaws circled and then broke and ran toward the heap of canvas bags.

Several ugly little fights broke out almost immediately, and three men were down before anyone thought to open one of the bags. The howls of rage could be heard quite clearly for some distance.  
  
Amethyst was laughing when they finally reined in their horses after a couple of miles of hard riding. "Poor Kroldor." She chortled. "You're a cruel woman, Viddy."   
  
"Most of the men I meet are so predictable," V replied somewhat arrogantly. "I can usually find a way to make them work for me."

 

They shared a wicked little laugh then.   
  
"Kroldor's men are going to blame **_him_ ** for the way things turned out," Ruby observed.   
  
"I know. But then, that's one of the hazards of leadership."   
  
"They might even kill him."   
  
"I certainly hope so. I'd be so terribly disappointed in them if they didn't."   


\------------------------------------------------------

  
They pushed on through the yellow foothills for the rest of the day and camped that night in a well-concealed little canyon where the light from their fire would not betray their location to the brigands who infested the region.

The next morning they started out early, and by noon they were in the mountains. They rode on up among the rocky crags, moving through a thick forest of dark green firs and spruces where the air was cool and spicy.

 

Although it was still summer in the lowlands, the first signs of autumn had begun to appear at the higher elevations. The leaves on the underbrush had begun to turn, the air had a faint, smoky haze, and there was frost on the ground each morning when they awoke. The weather held fair, however, and they made good time.  
  
Then, late one afternoon after they had been in the mountains for a week or more, a heavy bank of clouds moved in from the west, bringing with it a damp chill. Steven untied his cloak from the back of the saddle and pulled it around his shoulders as he rode, shivering as the afternoon grew colder.   
  
Bismuth lifted his face and sniffed at the air. "We'll have snow before morning," he predicted.   
  
Steven could also smell the chill, dusty odor of snow in the air. He nodded glumly.   
  
Mister Wolf grunted. "I knew this was too good to last." Then he shrugged. "Oh, well," he added, "we've all lived through winters before."   
  
When Steven poked his head out of the tent the next morning, an inch of snow lay on the ground beneath the dark firs. Soft flakes were drifting down, settling soundlessly and concealing everything more than a hundred yards away in a filmy haze.

The air was cold and gray, and the horses, looking very dark under a dusting of snow, stamped their feet and flicked their ears at the fairy touch of the snowflakes settling on them. Their breath steamed in the damp cold.  
  
Connie emerged from the tent she shared with Aunt Pearl with a squeal of delight.

Snow, Steven realized, was probably a rarity in Tol Maheshwar, and the tiny girl romped through the soft drifting flakes with childish abandon. He smiled wistfully until a well-aimed snowball caught him on the side of the head.

Then, roaring in mock rage, he chased her, pelting her with snowballs, while she dodged in and out among the trees, laughing and squealing. When he finally caught her, he was determined to wash her face with snow, but she exuberantly threw her arms around his neck and kissed him, her cold little nose rubbing against his cheek and her eyelashes thick with snowflakes. He didn't realize the full extent of her deceitfulness until she had already poured a handful of snow down the back of his neck.

Then she broke free and ran toward the tents, howling with laughter, while he tried to shake the snow out of the back of his tunic before it all melted.  
  
By midday, however, the snow on the ground had turned to slush, and the drifting flakes had become a steady, unpleasant drizzle. They rode up a narrow ravine under dripping firs while a torrentlike stream roared over boulders beside them.   
  
Mister Wolf finally called a halt. "We're getting close to the western border of Sivu Isyak," he told them. "I think it's time we started to take a few precautions."   
  
"I'll ride out in front," Ruby offered quickly.   
  
"Heh, nice try, but I'm afraid you're not going to do that, Ruby," Wolf replied. "You tend to get distracted when you see Isyaki."   
  
"I'll do it," V said. She had pulled her hood up, but water still dripped from the end of her sharp, pointy nose. "I'll stay about half a mile ahead and keep my eyes open."   
  
Wolf nodded. "Whistle if you see anything."   
  
"Right." V started off up the ravine at a trot.   


\------------

  
Late that afternoon, the rain began to freeze as it hit, coating the rocks and trees with gray ice. They rounded a large outcropping of rock and found V waiting for them.

The stream had turned to a trickle, and the walls of the ravine had opened out onto the steep side of a mountain.

 

"We've got about an hour of daylight left," the little woman said. "What do you think? Should we go on, or do you want to drop back down the ravine a bit and set up for the night?"  
  
Mister Wolf squinted at the sky and then at the mountainside ahead. The steep slope was covered with stunted trees, and the timberline lay not far above them. "We have to go around this and then down the other side. It's only a couple of miles. Let's go ahead."   
  
V nodded and led out again.   
  
They rounded the shoulder of the mountain and looked down into a deep gorge that separated them from the peak they had crossed two days before.

The rain had slackened with the approach of evening, and Steven could see the other side of the gorge clearly. It was not more than half a mile away, and his eyes caught a movement near the rim.

 

"What's that?" He pointed.  
  
Mister Wolf brushed the ice out of his beard. "I was afraid of that."   
  
"What?"   
  
"It's a Gem Mutant."   
  
With a shudder of revulsion, Steven remembered the mangled, faceless amalgamations that had attacked them in Flaxia. "Hadn't we better run?" he asked.   
  
"It can't get to us," Wolf replied. "The gorge is at least a mile deep. The Mareks have turned their beasts loose, though. It's something we're going to have to watch out for." He motioned for them to continue.   
  
Faintly, distorted by the wind that blew perpetually down the yawning gorge, Steven could hear the wailing moans of the gem mutants on the far side as it communicated with the rest of its pack.

Soon a dozen of the loathsome creatures were scampering along the rocky rim of the gorge, barking to one another and keeping pace with the party as they rode around the steep mountain face toward a shallow draw on the far side.

The draw led away from the gorge; after a mile, they stopped for the night in the shelter of a grove of scrubby spruces.  
  
It was colder the next morning and still cloudy, but the rain had stopped. They rode on back down to the mouth of the draw and continued following the rim of the gorge.

The face on the other side fell away in a sheer, dizzying drop for thousands of feet to the tiny-looking ribbon of the river at the bottom. The Gem mutants still kept pace with them, moaning and groaning and looking across with a dreadful hunger.

There were other things as well, dimly seen back among the trees on the other side. One of them, huge and shaggy, seemed even to have a human body, but its head was the head of a beast. A herd of swift-moving animals galloped along the fir rim, manes and tails tossing.  
  
"Look,” Ruby exclaimed in a rare show of emotion as she pointed at the gorge. "Wild horses."   
  
"They're not horses," Mister Wolf said grimly.   
  
"What? They look like horses to me."   
  
"They may look like it, but they aren't."   
  
"Helvstedarum, the Dreadsteeds," Aunt Pearl said shortly.   
  
"What's that?"   
  
"A Dreadsteed is a four-legged animal-like a horse-but it has fangs instead of teeth, and clawed feet instead of hooves."   
  
"But that would mean-" Ruby gasped, her eyes wide.   
  
"Yes. They're meat-eaters."   
  
She shuddered. "That's not right."   
  
"That gorge is getting narrower, Greg," Amethyst growled. "I'd rather not have any of those things on the same side as us."   
  
"We'll be all right. As I remember, it narrows down to about a hundred yards and then widens out again. They won't be able to get across."   
  
"Let's hope that memory of yours holds up."

 

\-------------  
  
The sky above looked ragged, tattered by a gusty wind. Vultures soared and circled over the gorge, and ravens flapped from tree to tree, croaking and squawking to one another. Aunt Pearl watched the birds with a look of stern disapproval, but said nothing.   
  
They rode on. The gorge grew narrower, and soon they could see the brutish faces of the Algroths on the other side clearly. When the Dreadsteeds, manes tossing in the wind, opened their mouths to whinny to each other, their long, pointed teeth were plainly visible.   
  
Then, at the narrowest point of the gorge, a party of mail-skirted Isyaki rode out onto the opposite precipice. Their horses were lathered from hard riding, and the Isyaki themselves were gaunt-faced and travel-stained.

They stopped and waited until Steven and his friends were opposite them. At the very edge, staring first across the gorge and then down at the river far below, stood Myr.  
  
"What kept you, darling?" V called in a bantering tone that had a deadly edge to it just below the surface. "We thought perhaps you'd gotten lost."   
  
"Not very likely, Viddy," Myr replied. At the pet name, both V and Amethyst were momentarily stunned. Myr, catching their expressions, continued, smiling. "How did you get across to that side?"   
  
"You go back that way about four days' ride," V shouted, pointing back the way they had come. "If you look very carefully, you'll find the part of the canyon that veers off into the deepest possible plunge you can take in these parts. You can do us a favour and fuck right off."   
  
One of the Isyakis pulled a short bow out from beneath his left leg and set an arrow to it. He pointed the arrow at V, drew back the string and released. V watched the arrow calmly as it fell down into the gorge, spinning in a long, slow-looking spiral. "Nice shot," she called.   
  
"Don't be an idiot," Myr snapped at the Isyaki with the bow. He looked back at V. "I've heard a great deal about you, Vidalia," he said.   
  
"My reputation precedes me," V replied dryly.   
  
"One of these days I'll have to find out if you're as good as they say."   
  
" **_That_ ** particular curiosity could be the first symptom of a fatal disease."   
  
"For one of us, at least."   
  
"I look forward to our next meeting, then," V told him. "I hope you'd excuse us, my dear-- pressing business, you know how it is."   
  
"Keep an eye out behind you, Viddy," Myr called, smirking once again as she winced. "One day I'll be there."   
  
"I always keep an eye out behind me, **_Marty_ ** ," V called back, "so don't be too surprised if I'm waiting for you. It's been wonderful chatting with you. We'll have to do it again-- **_soon_ ** ."   
  
The Isyaki with the bow shot another arrow. It followed his first into the gorge.   
  
V laughed and led the party away from the brink of the precipice. "What a splendid fellow," she said as they rode away. She looked up at the murky sky overhead. "And what an **_absolutely beautiful_ ** day."   


\-------------------------------------------------------

  
The clouds thickened and grew black as the day wore on. The wind picked up until it howled among the trees. Mister Wolf led them away from the gorge which separated them from Myr and his Isyaki, moving steadily toward the northeast.   
  
They set up for the night in a rock-strewn basin just below the timberline. Aunt Pearl prepared a meal of thick stew; as soon as they had finished eating, they let the fire go out.

 

"There's no point in lighting beacons for them," Wolf observed.  
  
"They can't get across the gorge, can they?" Bismuth asked.   
  
"It's better not to take chances," Wolf replied. He walked away from the last few embers of the dying fire and looked out into the darkness.

On an impulse. Steven followed him.  
  
"How much farther is it to the Vale, Grandfather?" he asked.   
  
"About seventy leagues," the old man told him.   
  
"We can't make very good time up here in the mountains."   
  
"The weather's getting worse, too."   
  
"I noticed that."   
  
"What happens if we get a real snowstorm?"   
  
"We take shelter until it blows over."   
  
"What if-"   
  
"Steven, I know it's only natural, but sometimes you sound a great deal like your Aunt. She's been saying **_'what if'_ ** to me since she was about seventeen. I've gotten terribly tired of it over the years."   
  
"I'm sorry."   
  
"Don't be sorry. Just don't do it anymore."   
  
Overhead in the pitch-blackness of the blustery sky, there was a sudden, ponderous flap as of enormous wings.   
  
"What's that?" Steven asked, startled.   
  
"Be still!" Wolf stood with his face turned upward. There was another great flap. "Oh, that's sad."   
  
"What?"   
  
"I thought the poor old brute had been dead for centuries. Why don't they leave her alone?"   
  
"What is it?"   
  
"It doesn't have a name. It's big and stupid and ugly. The Diamonds only made three of them, and the two males killed each other during the first mating season. She's been alone for as long as I can remember."   
  
"It sounds huge," Steven said, listening to the enormous wings beat overhead and peering up into the darkness. "What does it look like?"   
  
"She's as big as a house, and you really wouldn't want to see her."   
  
"Is she dangerous?"   
  
"Very dangerous, but she can't see too well at night." Wolf sighed. "The Mareks must have chased her out of her cave and put her to hunting for us. Sometimes they go too far."   
  
"Should we tell the others about her?"   
  
"It would only worry them. Sometimes it's better not to say anything."   
  
The great wings flapped again, and there was a long, despairing cry from the darkness, a cry filled with such aching loneliness that Steven felt a great surge of pity welling up in him.   
  
Wolf sighed again. "There's nothing we can do," he said. "Let's go back to the tents."


	9. Lachrymia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Their escape made, the foe they face next is one that cannot be fought, cannot be seen. The weather at their backs, they seek shelter in a cave. But not just any cave...

**THE WEATHER CONTINUED** raw and unsettled as they rode for the next two days up the long, sloping rise toward the snow-covered summits of the mountains. The trees became sparser and more stunted as they climbed and finally disappeared entirely. 

The ridgeline flattened out against the side of one of the mountains, and they rode up onto a steep slope of tumbled rock and ice where the wind scoured continually.   
  
Mister Wolf paused to get his bearings, looking around in the pale afternoon light. 

 

"That way," he said finally, pointing. 

A saddleback stretched between two peaks, and the sky beyond roiled in the wind. They rode up the slope, their cloaks pulled tightly about them.   
  
Ruby came forward with a worried frown on her cherubic face. "That pregnant mare's in trouble," she told Wolf. "I think her time's getting close."   
  
Without a word, Aunt Pearl dropped back to look at the mare, and her face was grave when she returned. 

 

"She's no more than a few hours away, father," she reported.   
  
Wolf looked around. "There's no shelter on this side."   
  
"Maybe there'll be something on the other side of the pass," Amethyst suggested, her mane whipping in the wind.   
  
Wolf shook his head. "I think it's the same as this side. We're going to have to hurry. We don't want to spend the night up here."   
  
As they rode higher, occasional spits of stinging sleet pelted them, and the wind gusted even stronger, howling among the rocks. As they crested the slope and started through the saddle, the full force of the gale struck them, driving a tattered sleet squall before it.   
  
"It's even worse on this side, Greg," Amethyst shouted over the wind. "How far is it down to the trees?"   
  
"Miles," Wolf replied, trying to keep his flying cloak pulled around him.   
  
"The mare will  **_never_ ** make it," Ruby said, a frantic note creeping into her voice. "We've  **_got_ ** to find shelter."   
  
" **_There isn't any,"_ ** Wolf stated. "Not until we get to the trees. It's all bare rock and ice up here."   
  
Without knowing why he said it - not even aware of it until he spoke - Steven made a shouted suggestion. "What about the cave?"   
  
Mister Wolf turned and looked sharply at him. "What cave? Where?"   
  
"The one in the side of the mountain. It isn't far." Steven knew the cave was there, but he did not know how he knew. Staring at each other, both Steven and Greg were silent for but a moment.    
  
"Are you  **_sure?"_ **   
  
"Of course. It's this way." Steven turned his horse and rode up the slope of the saddle toward the vast, craggy peak on their left. The wind tore at them as they rode, and the driving sleet half blinded them. 

Steven moved confidently, however. For some reason every rock about them seemed absolutely familiar, though he could not have said why. He rode just fast enough to stay in front of the others. He knew they would ask questions, and he didn't have any answers. 

 

They rounded a shoulder of the peak and rode out onto a broad rock ledge. The ledge curved along the mountainside, disappearing in the swirling sleet ahead.   
  
"Where're you taking us, Steven?" Jasper shouted to him.   
  
"It's not much farther," Steven yelled back over his shoulder.   
  
\------------------

 

The ledge narrowed as it curved around the looming granite face of the mountain. Where it bent around a jutting cornice, it was hardly more than a footpath. Steven dismounted and led his horse around the cornice. 

The wind blasted directly into his face as he stepped around the granite outcrop, and he had to put his hand in front of his face to keep the sleet from blinding him. Walking that way, he did not see the door until it was almost within reach of his hands.   
  
The door in the face of the rock was made of iron, black and pitted with rust and age. It was broader than the gate at Alger's farm, and the upper edge of it was lost in the swirling sleet.   
  
Amethyst, following close behind him, reached out and touched the iron door. Then she banged on it with her huge fist. The door echoed hollowly. 

 

"Well, whaddaya know, there is a cave," she said back over her shoulder to the others. “Nice one, Steven."   
  
"That's all well and good, but how do we get inside?" Ruby shouted, the wind snatching away his words.   
  
"The door's as solid as the mountain itself," Amethyst said, hammering with her fist again.   
  
"We've  **_got to_ ** get out of this wind," Aunt Pearl declared, one of her arms protectively about Connie's shoulders.   
  
"Well, Steven?" Mister Wolf shouted, his arms curled around him.    
  
"It's easy," Steven replied. "I just have to find the right spot." He ran his fingers over the icy iron, not knowing just what he was looking for. He found a spot that felt a little different. 

"Here it is." He put his right hand on the spot and pushed lightly. With a vast, grating groan, the door began to move. 

A line that had not even been visible before suddenly appeared like a razor-cut down the precise center of the pitted iron surface, and flakes of rust showered from the crack, to be whipped away by the wind.   
  
Steven felt a peculiar warmth in the silvery mark on the palm of his right hand where it touched the door. Curious, he stopped pushing, but the door continued to move, swinging open, it seemed, almost in response to the presence of the mark on his palm. It continued to move even after he was no longer touching it. He closed his hand, and the door stopped moving.   
  
He opened his hand, and the door, grating against stone, swung open even wider.   
  
"Stop playing around, Steven," Aunt Pearl told him. "Just open it."   
  


\----------------------------------------------------

  
It was dark in the cave beyond the huge door, but it seemed not to have the musty smell it should have had. They entered cautiously, feeling at the floor carefully with their feet.   
  
"Just a moment," Bismuth murmured in a strangely hushed voice. They heard him unbuckling one of his saddlebags and then heard the rasp of his flint against steel. 

There were a few sparks, then a faint glow as the smith blew on his tinder. The tinder flamed, and he set it to the torch he had pulled from his saddlebag. The torch sputtered briefly, then caught. Bismuth raised it, and they all looked around at the cave.   
  
It was immediately evident that the cave was not natural. The walls and floor were absolutely smooth, almost polished, and the light of Bismuth's torch reflected back from the gleaming surfaces. 

The chamber was perfectly round and about a hundred feet in diameter. The walls curved inward at they rose, and the ceiling high overhead seemed also to be round. 

In the precise center of the floor stood a round stone table, twenty feet across, with its top higher than Amethyst's head. A stone bench encircled the table. In the wall directly opposite the door was a circular arch of a fireplace. The cave was cool, but it did not seem to have the bitter chill it  **_should_ ** have had.   
  
"Is it all right to bring in the horses?" Ruby asked quietly.   
  
Mister Wolf nodded. His expression seemed bemused in the flickering torchlight, and his eyes were lost in thought.   
  
The horses' hooves clattered sharply on the smooth stone floor as they were led inside, and they looked around, their eyes wide and their ears twitching nervously.   
  
"There's a fire hearth in here," Bismuth said from the arched fireplace. "Shall I light it?"   
  
Wolf looked up. "What? Oh--yes. Go ahead, Bismuth."   
  
Bismuth reached into the fireplace with his torch, and the wood caught immediately. The fire swelled up very quickly, and the flames seemed inordinately bright.   
  
Connie gasped. "The walls! Look at the walls!" The light from the fire was somehow being refracted through the crystalline structure of the rock itself, and the entire dome began to glow with a myriad of shifting colors, filling the chamber with a soft, multihued radiance.

 

They all gasped as the soft hues of light, refracted through some invisible prism, illuminated a specific spot with each of their colours. As the room began to fill with radiance, each colour revealed the caricature of a lady, beautiful and resplendent, in various articles of clothing.

 

Connie gasped, her little hazel eyes widening. “Oh my stars. These must be--”

 

“The Diamonds” Steven finished, his face similarly awestruck.    
  
Ruby had moved around the circle of the wall and was peering into another arched opening. "A spring," she told them, oblivious to the event in the room. "This is a good place to ride out a storm."   
  
Bismuth put out his torch and pulled off his cloak. The chamber had become warm almost as soon as he had lighted the fire. He looked at Mister Wolf. "You know about this place, don't you?" he asked.   
  
"None of us has ever been able to find it before," the old man replied, his eyes still thoughtful. "We weren't even sure it still existed."   
  
"What is this strange place, Greg?" Jasper asked.   
  
Mister Wolf took a deep breath. "When the Diamonds were making the world, it was necessary for them to meet from time to time to discuss what each of them had done and was going to do so that everything would fit together and work in harmony-- the mountains, the winds, the seasons and so on." He looked around. "This is the place where they met."   
  
V, her nose twitching with curiosity, had climbed up onto the bench surrounding the huge table. 

"There are bowls up here," she said. "Seven of them-and seven cups. There seems to be some kind of fruit in the bowls." She began to reach out with one hand.   
  
" **_Vidalia!_ ** " Mister Wolf told her sharply. " **_Don't touch anything."_ ** V’s hand froze, and she looked back over her shoulder at the old man, her face startled.   
  
"You'd better come down from there," Wolf said gravely.   
  
"The door!" Connie exclaimed.   
  
They all turned in time to see the massive iron door gently swinging closed. With an oath, Amethyst leaped toward it, but she was too late. 

Booming hollowly, it clanged shut just before her hands reached it. The big gem turned, her eyes filled with dismay.   
  
"It's all right, Amethyst," Steven told him. "I can open it again."   
  
Wolf turned then and looked at Steven, his eyes questioning. "How did  **_you_ ** know about the cave?" he asked.   
  
Steven floundered helplessly. "I don't know. I just did. I think I've known we were getting close to it for the last day or so."   
  
"Does it have anything to do with the voice that spoke to Blue?"   
  
"I don't  **_think_ ** so. He doesn't seem to be there just now, and my knowing about the cave seemed to be different somehow, I think it came from me, not him, but I'm not sure how. For some reason, it seems that I've always known this place was here - only I didn't think about it until we started to get near it. It's awfully hard to explain it exactly."   
  
Aunt Pearl and Mister Wolf exchanged a long glance. Wolf looked as if he were about to ask another question, but just then there was a groan at the far end of the chamber.   
  
"Somebody help me," Ruby called urgently. One of the horses, her sides distended and her breath coming in short, heaving gasps, stood swaying as if her legs were about to give out from under her. Ruby stood at her side, trying to support her. "She's about to foal," she said.   
  
They all turned then and went quickly to the laboring mare. Aunt Pearl immediately took charge of the situation, giving orders crisply. 

They eased the mare to the floor, and Ruby and Bismuth began to work with her, even as Aunt Pearl filled a small pot with water and set it carefully in the fire. 

 

"I'll need some room," she told the rest of them pointedly as she opened the bag which contained her jars of herbs.   
  
"Why don't we all get out of your way?" Amethyst suggested, looking uneasily at the gasping horse.   
  
"Splendid idea," she agreed. "Connie, you stay here. I'll need your help."   
  
Steven, Amethyst, and Jasper moved a few yards away and sat down, leaning back against the glowing wall, while V and Mister Wolf went off to explore the rest of the chamber. 

As he watched Bismuth and Ruby with the mare and Aunt Pearl and Connie by the fire, Steven felt strangely abstracted. The cave had drawn him, there was no question of that, and even now it was exerting some peculiar force on him. Though the situation with the mare was immediate, he seemed unable to focus on it. He had a strange certainty that finding the cave was only the first part of whatever it was that was happening, There was something else he had to do, and his abstraction was in some way a preparation for it.   
  
"I… I don't confess this easily," Jasper was saying somberly.   
  
Steven glanced at him. 

 

"In view of the desperate nature of our quest, however," the knight continued, "I must openly acknowledge my great failure. It may so happen that at a time of mortal danger, where my duty is to protect you guys, I might fail and run like the coward I am."   
  
"You're making too much of it, sis," Amethyst told him.   
  
"No, Lord Amethyst. I must insist that you consider my proclamation seriously so you may know whether or not you need me for this journey." He started to creak to his feet.   
  
"Where are you going?" Amethyst asked.   
  
"I thought to leave so that you could have time alone to think on this."   
  
"Oh, sit down, Jasper," Amethyst said irritably. "I'm not going to say anything behind your back I wouldn't say to your face."   
  


\----------

  
The mare, lying close to the fire with her head cradled in Ruby's lap, groaned again. 

 

"Is that medicine almost ready, Pearl?" the Ainur asked in a worried voice.   
  
"Not quite," she replied. She turned back to Connie, who was carefully grinding up some dried leaves in a small cup with the back of a spoon.

"Break them up a little finer, dear," she instructed.   
  
Bismuth was standing astride the mare, his hands on her distended belly. "We may have to turn the foal," he said gravely. "I think it's trying to come the wrong way."   
  
"Don't start on that until this has a chance to work," Aunt Pearl told him, slowly tapping a grayish powder from an earthen jar into her bubbling pot, She took the cup of leaves from Connie and added that as well, stirring as she poured.   
  
"Amethyst, you don’t get it," Jasper urged, "Please reconsider the gravity of my words. I don’t say them lightly.”

  
"Yeah, I heard you. You said you were afraid once. It's nothing to worry about. It happens to  **_everybody_ ** now and then."   
  
“ **_I_ ** can’t live with it. I live now in constant apprehension, never knowing when it will return to unman me."   
  
Bismuth looked up from the mare. "You're afraid of  **_being afraid_ ** ?" he asked in a puzzled voice.   
  
"You cannot know what it was like, good friend," Jasper replied.   
  
"Your stomach tightened up," Bismuth told him. "Your mouth was dry, and your heart felt as if someone had his fist clamped around it?"   
  
Jasper blinked.   
  
"It's happened to me so often that I know exactly how it feels."   
  
"To you? But you’re among the bravest men I have ever known."   
  
Bismuth smiled wryly. "I'm an ordinary man, Jasper," he said. "Ordinary men live in fear all the time. Didn't you know that? We're afraid of the weather, we're afraid of powerful men, we're afraid of the night and the monsters that lurk in the dark, we're afraid of growing old and of dying. Sometimes we're even afraid of living. Ordinary men are afraid almost every minute of their lives."   
  
"How can you bear it?"   
  
"Do we have any choice? Fear's a part of life, Jasper, and it's the only life we have. You'll get used to it. After you've put it on every morning like an old tunic, you won't even notice it any more. Sometimes laughing at it helps - a little."   
  
" **_Laughing?_ ** "   
  
"It shows the fear that you know it's there, but that you're going to go ahead and do what you have to do anyway." Bismuth looked down at his hands, carefully kneading the mare's belly. "Some men curse and swear and bluster," he continued. "That does the same thing, I suppose. Every man has to come up with his own technique for dealing with it. Personally, I prefer laughing. It seems more appropriate somehow."   
  
Jasper's face became gravely thoughtful as Bismuth's words slowly sank in. "Huh," he said. "I will… think upon this. Thank you, good Bismuth. I owe you a great debt."   
  
Once more the mare groaned, a deep, tearing sound, and Bismuth straightened and began rolling up his sleeves. "The foal's going to have to be turned, Mistress Pearl," he said decisively. "And soon, or we'll lose the foal and the mare both."   
  
"Let me get some of this into her first," she replied, quenching her boiling pot with some cold water. "Hold her head," she told Ruby. Ruby nodded and firmly wrapped her arms around the laboring mare's head, crooning gently. 

 

"Steven," Aunt Pearl said, as she spooned the liquid between the mare's teeth, "why don't you and Connie go over there where V and your grandfather are?"   
  
"Have you ever turned a foal before, Bismuth?" Ruby asked anxiously.   
  
"Not a foal, but calves many times. A horse isn't that much different from a cow, really."   
  
Amethyst stood up quickly. Her face had a slight greenish cast to it. "I-I’ll go with Steven and the princess," she stammered. "I don't think I'd be much help here."   
  
"Good idea," Jasper declared. His face was also visibly pale. "It were best, I think, to leave our friends ample room for their midwifery."   
  
Aunt Pearl looked at the two warriors with a slight smile on her face, but said nothing.   
  
Steven and the others moved rather quickly away.   
  
V and Mister Wolf were standing beyond the huge stone table, peering into another of the circular openings in the shimmering wall. "I've never seen fruits exactly like those," the little woman was saying.   
  
"I'd be surprised if you had," Wolf replied.   
  
"They look as fresh as if they'd just been picked." V’s hand moved almost involuntarily toward the tempting fruit.   
  
"I wouldn't," Wolf warned.   
  
"I wonder what they taste like."   
  
"Wondering won't hurt you. Tasting might."   
  
"I hate an unsatisfied curiosity."   
  
"You'll get over it." Wolf turned to Steven and the others. "How's the horse?"   
  
"Bismuth says he's going to have to turn the foal," Amethyst told him. "We thought it might be better if we all got out of the way."   
  
Wolf nodded. "Vidalia!" he admonished sharply, not turning around.   
  
"Sorry." V snatched her hand back, pouting like a child caught in the act.   
  
"Why don't you just get away from there? You're only going to get yourself in trouble."   
  
V shrugged. "I do that all the time anyway."   
  
"Just do it, V," Wolf told him firmly. "I can't watch over you every minute." He slipped his fingers up under the dirty and rather ragged bandage on his arm, scratching irritably. "That's enough of that," he declared. "Steven, take this thing off me." He held out his arm.   
  
Steven backed away. "Not me," he refused. "Do you know what Aunt Pearl would say to me if I did that without her permission?"   
  
"Don't be silly. V, you do it."   
  
"First you say to stay out of trouble, and then you tell me to cross Polina? You're an inconsistent one, Greg."   
  
"Oh, here," Connie said. She took hold of the old man's arm and began picking at the knotted bandage with her tiny fingers. "Just remember that this was your idea. Steven, give me your knife."   
  
Somewhat reluctantly, Steven handed over his dagger. The princess sawed through the bandage and began to unwrap it. The splints fell clattering to the stone floor.   
  
"Ah, thank you Connie. Ohhh, that feels good." Mister Wolf beamed at her and began to scratch at his arm with obvious relief.   
  
"Just remember that you owe me a favor," she told him.   
  
"Hah! She's a Shwarean, all right," V observed.   
  


\------------

  
It was about an hour later when Aunt Pearl came around the table to them, her eyes sombre.   
  
"How's the mare?" Connie asked quickly.   
  
"Very weak, but I think she'll be all right."   
  
"What about the baby horse?"   
  
Aunt Pearl sighed. "We were too late. We tried everything, but we just… couldn't get him to start breathing."   
  
Connie gasped, her little face suddenly a deathly white. "You're not going to just  **_give up_ ** , are you?" She said it almost accusingly.   
  
"There's nothing more we can do, dear," Aunt Pearl told her sadly. "It took too long. He just didn't have enough strength left."   
  
Connie stared at her, unbelieving. "Do something!" she demanded. "You're a sorceress. Do something!"   
  
"I'm sorry, Connie, that's beyond our power. We can't reach beyond that barrier."   
  
The little princess wailed then and began to cry bitterly. Aunt Pearl put her arms comfortingly about her and held her as she sobbed, a lone tear rolling down her cheek as well.    
  
Steven, however, was already moving. With absolute clarity he now knew what it was that the cave expected of him, and he responded without thinking, not running or even hurrying. He walked quietly around the stone table toward the fire.   
  
Ruby sat cross-legged on the floor with the unmoving colt in her lap, her head bowed with sorrow and her manelike scalp lock falling across the spindle-shanked little animal's silent face.   
  
"Give him to me, Ruby," Steven said.   
  
"Steven! No!" Aunt Pearl's voice, coming from behind him, was alarmed.   
  
Ruby looked up, her round face filled with deep sadness.   
  
" **_Let me have him, Ruby_ ** ," Steven repeated very quietly. Wordlessly Ruby raised the limp little body, still wet and glistening in the firelight, and handed it to Steven. 

Steven knelt and laid the foal on the floor in front of the shimmering fire. He put his hands on the tiny ribcage and pushed gently. 

 

" **_Breathe,_ ** " he almost whispered.   
  
"We tried that, Steven," Ruby told him sadly. "We tried everything."   
  
A lump began to well in Steven's throat.   
  
"Don't do that, Steven," Aunt Pearl told him firmly. "It isn't possible, and you'll hurt yourself if you try."   
  
Steven was not listening to her. The cave itself was speaking to him too loudly for him to hear anything else. He focused his every thought on the wet, lifeless body of the foal. 

Then he stretched out his right hand and laid his palm on the unblemished, walnut-colored shoulder of the dead animal. Before him there seemed to be a blank wall - black and higher than anything else in the world, impenetrable and silent beyond his comprehension. 

 

Tentatively he pushed at it, but it would not move. He drew in a deep breath and hurled himself entirely into the struggle. " **_Live,_ ** " he said.   
  
"Steven, stop."   
  
But he would not listen. "Live," he said again, throwing himself deeper into his effort against that dark, impregnable wall. Tears began to flow as he redoubled his efforts.    
  
"It's too late now, Pearl," he heard Mister Wolf say from somewhere. "He's already committed himself."   
  
"Live," Steven repeated, “ **_Live,_ ** damn you.”

 

Nothing. He had failed. The surge he felt welling up out of him was so vast that it drained him utterly. What tears he had been holding back came flooding forth, pouring in rivulets down his cheeks. Droplets fell onto the colt's lifeless body. 

 

From somewhere deep within the mountain, a bell tolled. The glowing walls flickered. The sound shimmered, filling the air inside the domed chamber with a vibrant ringing. The light in the walls suddenly flared with a searing brightness, and the chamber was as bright as noon.   
  
The little body under Steven's hand quivered, and the colt drew in a deep, shuddering breath. The light, Steven discovered, radiated from beneath his hand in little pink ripples, soon covering the colt's entire body. 

Steven heard the others gasp as the sticklike little legs began to twitch. The colt inhaled again, and his eyes opened.   
  
"A miracle," Jasper said in a choked voice.   
  
"Perhaps even more than that," Mister Wolf replied, his eyes searching Steven's face.   
  
The colt struggled, his head wobbling weakly on his neck. He pulled his legs under him and began to struggle to his feet. Instinctively, he turned to his mother and tottered toward her to nurse. 

His coat, which had been a deep, solid brown before Steven had touched him, was now a pale, solid pink, marred only on the shoulder with a single incandescently white patch exactly the size of the mark on Steven's palm.   
  
Steven lurched to his feet and stumbled away, pushing past the others. He staggered to the icy spring bubbling in the opening in the wall and splashed water over his head and neck. He knelt before the spring, shaking and breathing hard for a very long time. Then he felt a tentative, almost shy touch on his elbow. 

 

When he wearily raised his head, he saw the now steadier colt standing at his side and gazing at him with adoration in its liquid eyes.


	10. The Warnings Come After

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things finally calm down for our little group as they decide their next course of action

**THE STORM BLEW** itself out the next morning, but they stayed in the cave for another day after the wind had died down to allow the mare to recover and the newborn colt to gain a bit more strength. Steven found the attention of the little animal disturbing. It seemed that no matter where he went in the cave, those soft eyes followed him, and the colt was continually nuzzling at him. The other horses also watched him with a kind of mute respect. All in all it was a bit embarrassing.   
  
On the morning of their departure, they carefully removed all traces of their stay from the cave. The cleaning was spontaneous, neither the result of some suggestion or of any discussion, but rather was something in which they all joined without comment.   
  
"The fire's still burning," Bismuth fretted, looking back into the glowing dome from the doorway as they prepared to leave.   
  
"It will go out by itself after we leave," Wolf told him. "I don't think you could put it out anyway - no matter how hard you tried."   
  
Bismuth nodded soberly. "You're probably right," he agreed.   
  
"Close the door, Steven," Aunt Pearl said after they had led their horses out onto the ledge outside the cave.   
  
Somewhat self consciously, Steven took hold of the edge of the huge iron door and pulled it. Although Amethyst with all her great strength had tried without success to budge the door, it moved easily as soon as Steven's hand touched it. A single tug was enough to set it swinging gently closed. The two solid edges came together with a great, hollow boom, leaving only a thin, nearly invisible line where they met.   
  
Mister Wolf put his hand lightly on the pitted iron, his eyes far away. Then he sighed once, turned, and led them back along the ledge the way they had come two days before.   
  
—————————————————

 

Once they had rounded the shoulder of the mountain, they remounted and rode on down through the tumbled boulders and patches of rotten ice to the first low bushes and stunted trees a few miles below the pass. Although the wind was still brisk, the sky overhead was blue, and only a few fleecy clouds raced by, appearing strangely close.   
  
Steven rode up to Mister Wolf and fell in beside him. His mind was filled with confusion by what had happened in the cave, and he desperately needed to get things straightened out. 

"Grandfather," he said.   
  
"Yes, Shtu-roll?" the old man answered, rousing himself from his half doze.   
  
"Why did Aunt Pearl try to stop me? With the colt, I mean?"   
  
"Because it was dangerous," the old man replied. " **_Very_ ** dangerous."   
  
"Why dangerous?"   
  
"When you try to do something that's impossible, you can pour too much energy into it; and if you keep trying, it can be fatal."   
  
"Fatal?"   
  
Wolf nodded. "You drain yourself out completely, and you don't have enough strength left to keep your own heart beating."   
  
"I didn't know that." Steven was shocked.   
  
Wolf ducked as he rode under a low branch. "Obviously."   
  
"Don't you keep saying that nothing is impossible?"   
  
" **_Within reason,_ ** Steven. Within reason."   
  
They rode on quietly for a few minutes, the sound of their horses' hooves muffled by the thick moss covering the ground under the trees. "Maybe I'd better find out more about all this," Steven said finally.   
  
"That's not a bad idea. What was it you wanted to know?"   
  
"Everything, I guess."   
  
Mister Wolf laughed. "That would take a very long time, I'm afraid."   
  
Steven's heart sank. "Is it that complicated?"   
  
"No. Actually it's very simple, but simple things are always the hardest to explain."   
  
"That doesn't make  **_any_ ** sense," Steven retorted, a bit irritably.   
  
"Oh?" Wolf looked at him with amusement. "Let me ask you a simple question, then. What's two and two?"   
  
"Four," Steven replied promptly.   
  
"Why?"   
  
Steven floundered for a moment. "It just is," he answered lamely.   
  
"But why?"   
  
"There isn't any why to it. It just is."   
  
"There's a why to everything, Steven."   
  
"All right, why is two and two four then?"   
  
"I don't know," Wolf admitted. "I thought maybe you might." 

 

They passed a dead snag standing twisted and starkly white against the deep blue sky.   
  
"Are we getting anywhere?" Steven asked, even more confused now.   
  
"Actually, I think we've come a very long way," Wolf replied. "Precisely what was it you wanted to know?"   
  
Steven put it as directly as he knew how. "What is sorcery?"   
  
"I told you that once already. The Essence and The Will."   
  
"That doesn't really mean anything, you know."   
  
"All right, try it this way. Sorcery is doing things with your mind instead of your hands. Most people don't use it because at first it's much easier to do things the other way."   
  
Steven frowned. "It doesn't seem hard."   
  
"That's because the things you've been doing have come out of impulse. You've never sat down and thought your way through something - you just do it."   
  
"Isn't it easier that way? What I mean is, why not just do it and not think about it?"   
  
"Because spontaneous sorcery is just third-rate magic - completely uncontrolled. Anything can happen if you simply turn the power of your mind loose. It has no morality of its own. The good or the bad of it comes out of you, not out of the sorcery."   
  
"You mean that when I burned Bloodstone, it was me and not the sorcery?" Steven asked, feeling a bit sick at the thought.   
  
Mister Wolf nodded gravely. "It might help if you remember that you were also the one who gave life to the colt. The two things sort of balance out."   
  
Steven glanced back over his shoulder at the colt, who was frisking along behind him like a puppy. 

"What you're saying is that it can be either good or bad."   
  
"No," Wolf corrected. "By itself it has nothing to do with good or bad. And it won't help you in any way to make up your mind how to use it. You can do anything you want to with it - almost anything, that is. You can bite the tops off all the mountains or stick the trees in the ground upside down or turn all the clouds green, if you feel like it. What you have to decide is whether you should do something, not whether you can do it."   
  
"You said almost anything," Steven noted quickly.   
  
"I'm getting to that," Wolf said. He looked thoughtfully at a low-flying cloud - an ordinary-looking old man in a rusty tunic and gray hood looking at the sky. "There's one thing that's absolutely forbidden. You can never  **_destroy_ ** anything - not ever."   
  
Steven was baffled by that. "I destroyed Bloodstone, didn't I?"   
  
"No. You killed him. There's a difference. You set fire to him, and he burned to death. To destroy something is to try to uncreate it. That's what's forbidden."   
  
"What would happen if I did try?"   
  
"Your power would turn inward on you, and you'd be obliterated in an instant."   
  
Steven blinked and then suddenly went cold at the thought of how close he had come to crossing that forbidden line in his encounter with Bloodstone. 

"How do I tell the difference?" he asked in a hushed voice. "I mean, how do I go about explaining that I only meant to kill somebody and not destroy him?"   
  
"It's not a good area for experimentation," Wolf told him. "If you really want to kill somebody, stick your sword in him. Hopefully you won't have occasion to do that sort of thing too often."   
  
They stopped at a small brook trickling out of some mossy stones to allow their horses to drink.   
  
"You see, Steven," Wolf explained, "the ultimate purpose of the universe is to create things. It will not permit you to come along behind it uncreating all the things it went to so much trouble to create in the first place. When you kill somebody, all you've really done is alter him a bit. You've changed him from being alive to being dead. He's still there. To uncreate him, you have to will him out of existence entirely. When you feel yourself on the verge of telling something to 'vanish' or 'go away' or 'be not,' you're getting very close to the point of self destruction. That's the main reason we have to keep our emotions under control all the time."   
  
"I didn't know that," Steven admitted.   
  
"You do now. Don't even try to unmake a single pebble."   
  
"A pebble?"   
  
"The universe doesn't make any distinction between a pebble and a man." The old man looked at him somewhat sternly. "Your Aunt's been trying to explain the necessity for keeping yourself under control for several months now, and you've been fighting her every step of the way."   
  
Steven hung his head. "I didn't know what she was getting at," he apologized.   
  
"That's because you weren't listening. That's a great failing of yours, Steven."   
  
Steven flushed. "What happened the first time you found out you could - well - do things?" he asked quickly, wanting to change the subject.   
  
"It was something silly," Wolf replied. "It usually is, the first time."   
  
"What was it?"   
  
Wolf shrugged. "I wanted to move a big rock. My arms and back weren't strong enough, but my mind was. After that I didn't have any choice but to learn to live with it because, once you unlock it, it's unlocked forever. That's the point where your life changes and you have to start learning to control yourself."   
  
"It always gets back to that, doesn't it?"   
  
"Always," Wolf said. "It's not as difficult as it sounds, really. Look at Jasper." He pointed at the knight, who was riding with Bismuth. The two of them were in a deep discussion. "Now, Jasper’s a nice enough fellow - honest, sincere, toweringly noble - but let's be honest. His mind has never been violated by an original thought - until now. He's learning to control fear, and learning to control it is forcing him to think - probably for the first time in his whole life. It's painful for him, but he's doing it. If Jasper can learn to control fear with that limited brain of his, surely you can learn the same kind of control over the other emotions. After all, you're quite a bit brighter than he is."   
  
V, who had been scouting ahead, came riding back to join them. "Greg," she said, "there's something about a mile in front of us that I think you'd better take a look at."   
  
"All right," Wolf replied. "Think about what I've been saying, Steven. We'll talk more about it later." Then he and V moved off through the trees at a gallop.   
  


—————-

  
Steven pondered what the old man had told him. The one thing that bothered him the most was the crushing responsibility his unwanted talent placed upon him.   
  
The colt frisked along beside him, galloping off into the trees from time to time and then rushing back, his little hooves pattering on the damp ground. 

Frequently he would stop and stare at Steven, his eyes full of love and trust.   
  
"Oh, stop that," Steven told him.   
  
The colt scampered away again.   
  
Princess Connie moved her horse up until she was beside Steven. "What were you and Mr Greg talking about?" she asked.   
  
Steven shrugged. "A lot of things."   
  
There was immediately a hard little tightening around her eyes. In the months that they had known each other, Steven had learned to catch those minute danger signals. 

Something warned him that the princess was spoiling for an argument, and with an insight that surprised him he reasoned out the source of her unspoken belligerence. What had happened in the cave had shaken her badly, and Connie did not like to be shaken. 

 

To make matters even worse, the princess had made a few coaxing overtures to the colt, obviously wanting to turn the little animal into her personal pet. The colt, however, ignored her completely, fixing all his attention on Steven, even to the point of ignoring his own mother unless he was hungry. Connie disliked being ignored even more than she disliked being shaken. Glumly, Steven realized how small were his chances of avoiding a squabble with her.   
  
"I certainly wouldn't want to  **_pry_ ** into a private conversation," she said tartly.   
  
"It wasn't private. We were talking about sorcery and how to keep accidents from happening. I don't want to make any more mistakes."   
  
She turned that over in her mind, looking for something offensive in it. His mild answer seemed to irritate her all the more. 

 

"I don't believe in sorcery," she said flatly. In the light of all that had recently happened, her declaration was patently absurd, and she seemed to realize that as soon as she said it. Her eyes hardened even more.   
  
Steven sighed. 

 

"All right," he said with resignation, "was there anything in particular you wanted to fight about, or did you just want to start yowling and sort of make it up as we go along?"   
  
"Yowling?" Her voice went up several octaves. "Yowling?"   
  
" **_Screeching_ ** , maybe," he suggested as insultingly as possible. As long as the fight was inevitable anyway, he determined to get in a few digs at her before her voice rose to the point where she could no longer hear him.   
  
" **_SCREECHING?_ ** " she screeched.   
  
The fight lasted for about a quarter of an hour before Amethyst and Aunt Pearl moved forward to separate them. On the whole, it was not very satisfactory. Steven was a bit too preoccupied to put his heart into the insults he flung at the tiny girl, and Connie's irritation robbed her retorts of their usual fine edge. Toward the end, the whole thing had degenerated into a tedious repetition of "spoiled brat" and "stupid peasant" echoing endlessly back from the surrounding mountains.   
  
Mister Wolf and V rode back to join them. "What was all the yelling?" Wolf asked.   
  
"The children were playing," Aunt Pearl replied with a withering look at Steven.   
  
"Where's Ruby?" V asked.   
  
"Right behind us," Amethyst said. She turned to look back toward the packhorses, but the tall Ainur was nowhere to be seen. Amethyst frowned. "But she was just there. Maybe she stopped for a moment to rest her horse or something."   
  
"Without saying anything?" V objected. "That's not like her. And it's not like her to leave the packhorses unattended either."   
  
"She must have  **_some_ ** good reason," Bismuth said.   
  
"I'll go back and look for her," Amethyst offered.   
  
"No," Mister Wolf told him. "Wait a few minutes. Let's not get scattered all over these mountains. If anybody goes back, we'll all go back."   
  
They waited. The wind stirred the branches of the pines around them, making a mournful, sighing sound.   
  
After several moments, Aunt Pearl let out her breath almost explosively. "She’s coming." There was a steely note in her voice. "She’s been entertaining herself."   
  
————————

 

From far back up the trail, Ruby appeared in her crimson leather clothing, riding easily at a loping canter with his long scalp lock flowing in the wind. She was leading two saddled but riderless horses. As he drew nearer, they could hear her whistling an old Western tune to herself.   
  
"Where in the heck have you been?" Amethyst demanded.   
  
"There were a couple of Isyaki following us," Ruby replied as if that explained everything.   
  
"You might have asked  **_me_ ** to go along," Amethyst said, sounding a little injured.   
  
Ruby shrugged. "There were only two. They were riding Ainur horses, so I took it rather personally."   
  
"It seems that you always find some reason to take it personally where Isyaki are concerned," Aunt Pearl said crisply.   
  
"It  **_does_ ** seem to work out that way, doesn't it?"   
  
"Didn't it occur to you to let us know you were going?" she asked.   
  
"There were only two," Ruby said again. "I didn't expect to be gone for very long."   
  
She drew in a deep breath, her eyes flashing dangerously.   
  
"Let it go, Pearl," Mister Wolf told her.   
  
"But-"   
  
"You're not going to change her, so why excite yourself about it? Besides, it's just as well to discourage pursuit." The old man turned to Ruby, ignoring the dangerous look Aunt Pearl leveled at him. "Were the Isyaki some of those who were with Myr?" he asked.   
  
Ruby shook his head. "No. Myr's Isyakis were from the south and they were riding Isyaki horses. These two were northern Isyaki."   
  
"Is there a visible difference?" Jasper asked curiously.   
  
"The armor is slightly different, and the southerners have flatter faces and they're not quite so tall. Though mostly it was the horses that told me.”

  
"Where did they get Ainur horses?" Steven asked.   
  
"They're herd raiders," Ruby answered bleakly. "Ainur horses are valuable in Siva Isyak, and certain Isyakis make a practice of creeping down into Aine on horse-stealing expeditions. We try to discourage that as much as possible."   
  
"These horses aren't in very good shape," Bismuth observed, looking at the two weary-looking animals Ruby was leading. "They've been ridden hard, and there are whip cuts on them."   
  
Ruby nodded grimly. "That's another reason to hate Isyaki."   
  
"Did you bury them?" Amethyst asked.   
  
"No. I left them where any other Isyakis who might be following could find them. I thought it might help to educate any who come along later."   
  
"There are some signs that others have been through here, too," V said. "I found the tracks of a dozen or so up ahead."   
  
"It was to be expected, I suppose," Mister Wolf commented, scratching at his beard. "Aquamarine's got her Mareks out in force, and Tor Unalaq is probably having the region patrolled. I'm sure they'd like to stop us if they could. I think we should move on down into the Vale as fast as possible. Once we're there, we won't be bothered any more."   
  
"Won't they follow us into the Vale?" Bismuth asked, looking around nervously.   
  
"No. Isyakis won't go into the Vale - not for any reason. Grey Diamond’s Spirit is there, and the Isyakis are desperately afraid of her."   
  
"How many days to the Vale?" V asked.   
  
"Four or five, if we ride hard," Wolf replied.   
  
"We'd better get started then."


	11. Remnants of Another Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Grandpa Greg takes a walk down memory lane, and he takes Steven along with. Together, Steven begins to rediscover his ancient heritage.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I know some of you would like to know more about the power system in this Fantasy AU.
> 
> Well, here it is.

**THE WEATHER, WHICH** had seemed on the brink of winter in the higher mountains, softened back into autumn as they rode down from the peaks and ridges. The forests in the hills above Lanzalore had been thick with fir and spruce and heavy undergrowth. On this side, however, the dominant tree was the pine, and the undergrowth was sparse. The air seemed drier, and the hillsides were covered with high, yellow grass.   
  
They passed through an area where the leaves on the scattered bushes were bright red; then, as they moved lower, the foliage turned first yellow, then green again. 

Steven found this reversal of the seasons strange. It seemed to violate all his perceptions of the natural order of things. By the time they reached the foothills above the Vale of Grey Diamond, it was late summer again, golden and slightly dusty. 

 

Although they frequently saw evidences of the Isyaki patrols which were crisscrossing the region, they had no further encounters. After they crossed a certain undefined line, there were no more tracks of Isyaki horses. There were spates of horse tracks leading  **_to_ ** that line, but beyond that, they mysteriously disappeared.    
  
They rode down beside a turbulent stream which plunged over smooth, round rocks, frothing and roaring. The stream was one of several forming the headwaters of the Grey River, a broad flow running through the vast Ainurean plain to empty into the Gulf of Wy-Ate, eight hundred leagues to the northwest.   
  
The Grey Vale was a valley lying in the embrace of the two mountain ranges which formed the central spine of the continent. 

It was lush and green, covered with high grass and dotted here and there with huge, solitary trees. Deer and wild horses grazed there, as tame as cattle. Swallows wheeled and dove, filling the air with their song. 

As the party rode out into the valley, Steven noticed that the birds seemed to gather wherever Aunt Pearl moved, and many of the braver ones even settled on her shoulders, warbling and trilling to her in welcome and adoration.   
  
"I'd forgotten about that," Mister Wolf said to Steven. "It's going to be difficult to get her attention for the next few days."   
  
"Why?"   
  
"Every bird in the Vale is going to stop by to visit her. It happens every time we come here. The birds go wild at the sight of her."   
  
Out of the welter of confused bird sound it seemed to Steven that faintly, almost like a murmuring whisper, he could hear a chorus of chirping voices repeating, "Polina. Polina. Polina."   
  
"Is it my imagination, or are they actually talking?" he asked.   
  
"I'm surprised you haven't heard them before," Wolf replied. "Every bird we've passed for the last ten leagues has been babbling her name."   
  
" **_Look at me, Polina, look at me,_ ** " a swallow seemed to say, hurling himself into a wild series of swooping dives around her head. She smiled gently at him, murmuring words of encouragement, and he redoubled his efforts.   
  
"I've never heard them talk before," Steven marveled.   
  
"They talk to her all the time," Wolf said. "Sometimes they go on for hours. That's why she seems a little abstracted sometimes. She's listening to the birds. Your Aunt moves through a world filled with conversation."   
  
"I didn't know that."   
  
"Not many people do."   
  
The colt, who had been trotting rather sedately along behind Steven as they had come down out of the foothills, went wild with delight when he reached the lush grass of the Vale. With an amazing burst of speed, he ran out over the meadows. He rolled in the grass, his thin legs flailing. He galloped in long, curving sweeps over the low, rolling hilts. He deliberately ran at herds of grazing deer, startling them into flight and then plunging along after them. 

 

"Come back here!" Steven shouted at him.   
  
"He won't hear you," Ruby said, smiling at the little horse's antics. "At least, he'll pretend that he doesn't. He's having too much fun."   
  
" _ Get back here right now! _ " Steven projected the thought a bit more firmly than he'd intended. The colt's forelegs stiffened, and he slid to a stop. Then he turned and trotted obediently back to Steven, his eyes apologetic. 

 

" **_Bad_ ** horse!" Steven chided.   
  
The colt hung his head.   
  
"Don't scold him, Shtu-roll," Wolf said. "You were very young once yourself."   
  
Steven immediately regretted what he had said and reached down to pat the little animal's shoulder. "It's all right," he apologized. The colt looked at him gratefully and began to frisk through the grass again, although staying close.   
  
Princess Connie had been watching him. She always seemed to be watching him for some reason. She would look at him, her eyes speculative and a tendril of her coppery hair coiled about one finger and raised absently to her teeth. It seemed to Steven that every time he turned around she was watching and nibbling. For some reason he could not quite put his finger on, it made him very nervous. 

 

"If he were mine, I wouldn't be so cruel to him," she accused, taking the tip of the curl from between her teeth.   
  
Steven chose not to answer that.

 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------   
  
As they rode down the valley, they passed several ruined towers, standing some distance apart and all showing signs of great antiquity. Each of them appeared to have originally been about sixty feet high, though weather and the passage of years had eroded them down considerably. The last of the three looked as if it had been blackened by some intensely hot fire.   
  
"Was there some kind of war here, Grandfather?" Steven asked.   
  
"No," Wolf replied rather sadly. "The towers belonged to... my sisters. That one over there belonged to Ruby, and that one to Pearl." he said, pointing to the first two.

 

“Ruby? Pearl? Wait, aren’t those…?”

 

“Oh, well, no. All gems are named after their gemstones. So while our Ruby and my Ruby may sound the same, they’re two different people.”

 

“Doesn’t that get confusing?”

 

“Not for them,” Wolf said pensively. “Gems can tell each other apart as naturally as they can walk, or talk.”   
  
"Wait, if they’re gems… then how did they die? Did they  **_shatter themselves_ ** ?"   
  
" **_No,_ ** of course they didn’t. Shattering’s a very physically painful experience, Steven. They simply grew tired-- or maybe they lost hope,” Wolf’s voice trailed off there. “They caused themselves no longer to exist."   
  
"They killed themselves?"   
  
"In a manner of speaking. It was a little more complete than that, though."   
  
Steven didn't press it, since the old man appeared to prefer not to go into details. "What about the other one - the one that's been burned? Whose tower was that?"   
  
"Andarion’s."   
  
"Did you and the other sorcerers burn it after he went over to Black Diamond?"   
  
"No. He burned it himself. I suppose he thought that was a way to show us that he was no longer a member of our little family. Andy’s always liked dramatic gestures."   
  
"Where's your tower?"   
  
"Further on down the Vale."   
  
"Will you show it to me?"   
  
"If you like."   
  
"Does Aunt Pearl have her own tower?"   
  
"No. She stayed with me while she was growing up, and then we went out into the world. We never got around to building her one of her own."   
  


\----------------------------------

  
They rode until late afternoon and stopped for the day beneath an enormous tree which stood alone in the center of a broad meadow. The tree quite literally shaded whole acres. Connie sprang out of her saddle and ran toward the tree, her hazelnut brown hair flying behind her. 

 

"He's beautiful!" she exclaimed, placing her hands with reverent affection on the rough bark.   
  
Mister Wolf shook his head. " **_Dryads_ ** . They grow giddy at the sight of trees."   
  
"I don't recognize it," Bismuth said with a slight frown. "It's not an oak."   
  
"Maybe it's some southern species," Amethyst suggested. "I've never seen one exactly like it either."   
  
"He's very old," Connie said, putting her cheek fondly against the tree trunk, "and he speaks strangely - but he likes me."   
  
"What kind of tree is it?" Bismuth  asked. He was still frowning, his need to classify and categorize frustrated by the huge tree.   
  
"It's the only one of its kind in the world," Mister Wolf told him. "I don't think we ever named it. It was always just the tree. We used to meet here sometimes."   
  
"It doesn't seem to drop any berries or fruit or seeds of any kind," Bismuth  observed, examining the ground beneath the spreading branches.   
  
"It doesn't need them," Wolf replied. "As I told you, it's the only one of its kind. It's always been here - and always will be. It feels no urge to propagate itself."   
  
Bismuth  seemed worried about it. "I've never heard of a tree with no seeds."   
  
"It's a rather special tree, Bismuth," Aunt Pearl said, coming back to reality. "It sprouted on the day the world was made, and it will probably stand here for as long as the world exists. It has a purpose other than reproducing itself."   
  
"What purpose is that?"   
  
"We don't know," Wolf answered. "We only know that it's the oldest living thing in the world. Maybe that's its purpose. Maybe it's here to demonstrate that life finds a way."   
  
Connie had removed her shoes and was climbing up into the thick branches, making little sounds of affection and delight.   
  
"Is there by any chance a tradition linking Dryads with squirrels?" V asked.   
  
Mister Wolf smiled. "If the rest of you can manage without us, Steven and I have something to attend to."   
  
Aunt Pearl looked questioningly at him.   
  
"It's time for a little instruction, Pearl," he explained.   
  
"We can manage, Greg," she said. "Will you be back in time for supper?"   
  
"Keep it warm for us. Shtu-roll, you coming?"

 

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------   
  
The two of them rode in silence through the green meadows with the golden afternoon sunlight making the entire Vale warm and lovely. Steven was baffled by Mister Wolf's curious change of mood. Always before, there had been a sort of impromptu quality about the old man. He seemed frequently to be making up his life as he went along, relying on chance, his wits, and his power, when necessary, to see him through. Here in the Vale, he seemed serene, undisturbed by the chaotic events taking place in the world outside.   
  
About two miles from the tree stood another tower. It was rather squat and round and was built of rough stone. Arched windows near the top faced out in the directions of the four winds, but there seemed to be no door.   
  
"You said you'd like to visit my tower," Wolf said, dismounting. "This is it."   
  
"It isn't ruined like the others."   
  
"I take care of it from time to time. Shall we go up?"   
  
Steven slid down from his horse. "Where's the door?" he asked.   
  
"Right there." Wolf pointed at a large stone in the rounded wall. Steven looked skeptical.   
  
Mister Wolf stepped in front of the stone. "It's me," he said. " **_Open._ ** "   
  
The surge Steven felt at the old man's word seemed common place ordinary - a household kind of surge that spoke of something that had been done so often that it was no longer a wonder. The rock turned obediently, revealing a sort of narrow, irregular doorway. Motioning for Steven to follow, Wolf squeezed through into the dim chamber beyond the door.   
  
The tower, Steven saw, was not a hollow shell as he had expected, but rather was a solid pedestal, pierced only by a stairway winding upward.   
  
"Come along," Wolf told him, starting up the worn stone steps. "Watch that one," he said about halfway up, pointing at one of the steps. "The stone is loose."   
  
"Why don't you fix it?" Steven asked, stepping up over the loose stone.   
  
"I've been meaning to, but I just haven't gotten around to it. It's been that way for a long time. I'm so used to it now that I never seem to think of fixing it when I'm here."   
  
The chamber at the top of the tower was round and very cluttered. A thick coat of dust lay over everything. There were several tables in various parts of the room, covered with rolls and scraps of parchment, strange-looking implements and models, bits and pieces of rock and glass, and a couple of birds' nests; on one, a curious stick was so wound and twisted and coiled that Steven's eye could not exactly follow its convolutions. He picked it up and turned it over in his hands, trying to trace it out. 

 

"What's this, Grandfather?" he asked.   
  
"One of Pearl's old toys," the old man said absently, staring around at the dusty chamber.   
  
"What's it supposed to do?"   
  
"It kept her quiet when she was a baby. It's only got one end. She spent five years trying to figure it out."   
  
Steven pulled his eyes off the fascinatingly compelling piece of wood. "That's a cruel sort of thing to do to a child."   
  
"I had to do something," Wolf answered. "She had a penetrating voice as a child. Rosalie was a quiet, happy little girl, but your Aunt never seemed satisfied."   
  
"Rosalie?"   
  
"Your Aunt's twin sister." The old man's voice trailed off, and he looked sadly out of one of the windows for a few moments. Finally he sighed and turned back to the round room. "I suppose I ought to clean this up a bit," he said, looking around at the dust and litter.   
  
"Let me help," Steven offered.   
  
"Just be careful not to break anything," the old man warned. "Some of those things took me centuries to make." He began moving around the chamber, picking things up and setting them down again, blowing now and then on them to clear away a bit of the dust. His efforts didn't really seem to be getting anywhere.   
  
Finally he stopped, staring at a low, rough-looking chair with the rail along its back, scarred and gashed as if it had been continually grasped by strong claws. He sighed again.   
  
"What's wrong?" Steven asked.   
  
"Rose's chair," Wolf said. "--My wife, Rosalina. She used to perch there and watch me - sometimes for years on end."   
  
"Perch?"   
  
"She was fond of the shape of the owl."   
  
"Oh." Steven had somehow never thought of the old man as ever having been married, although he obviously had to have been at some time, since Aunt Pearl and her twin sister were his daughters. The shadowy wife's affinity for owls, however, explained Aunt Pearl's own preference for that shape. The two women, Polina and Rosalie, were involved rather intimately in his own background, he realized, but quite irrationally he resented them. They had shared a part of the lives of his Aunt and his grandfather that he would never - could never know.   
  
The old man moved a parchment and picked up a peculiar-looking device with a sighting glass in one end of it. "I thought I'd lost you," he told the device, touching it with a familiar fondness. "You've been under that parchment all this time."   
  
"What is it?" Steven asked him.   
  
"A thing I made when I was trying to discover the reason for mountains."   
  
"The reason?"   
  
"Everything has a reason." Wolf raised the instrument. "You see, what you do is-" He broke off and laid the device back on the table. "It's much too complicated to explain. I'm not even sure if I remember exactly how to use it myself. I haven't touched it since before Andy came to the Vale. When he arrived, I had to lay my studies aside to train him." He looked around at the dust and clutter. "This is useless," he said. "The dust will just come back anyway."   
  
"Were you alone here before Andy came?"   
  
"My Master was here. That's her tower over there." Wolf pointed through the north window at a tall, slender stone structure about a mile away.   
  
"Was she really here?" Steven asked. "I mean, not just her spirit?"   
  
"No. She was  **_really_ ** here. That was before the Gods departed."   
  
"Did you live here always?"   
  
"No. I came like a thief, looking for something to steal - well, that's not actually true, I suppose. I was about your age when I came here, and I was dying at the time."   
  
"Dying?" Steven was startled.   
  
"Freezing to death. I'd left the village I was born in the year before after my mother died - and spent my first winter in the camp of the Off Colors. They were very old by then."   
  
"Off Colors?"   
  
"Phenaidians - or rather the ones who decided not to follow Phenom to Diophe. They stopped having children and gemlings after that, so they were happy to take me in. I couldn't understand their language at the time, and all their pampering got on my nerves, so I ran away in the spring. I was on my way back the next fall, but I got caught in an early snowstorm not far from here. I lay down against the side of my Master's tower to die - I didn't know it was a tower at first. With all the snow swirling around, it just looked like a pile of rock. As I recall, I was feeling rather sorry for myself at the time."   
  
"I can imagine." Steven shivered at the thought of being alone and dying.   
  
"I was sniveling a bit, and the sound disturbed my Master. She let me in - probably more to shut me up than for any other reason. As soon as I got inside, I started looking for things to steal."   
  
"But she made you a sorcerer instead."   
  
"No. She made me a servant -  **_a slave_ ** . I worked for her for five years before I even found out who she was. Sometimes I think I hated her, but I had to do what she told me to - I didn't really know why. The last straw came when she told me to move a big rock out of her way. I tried with all my strength, but I couldn't budge it. Finally I got angry enough to move it with my mind instead of my back. That's what she'd been waiting for, of course. After that we got along better. Much better. He changed my name from Greg to Gregarion, and she made me her pupil."   
  
"And her disciple?"   
  
"That took a little longer. I had a lot to learn. I was examining the reason that certain stars fell at the time she first called me her disciple and she was working on a round, gray stone she'd picked up by the riverbank."   
  
"Did you ever discover the reason - that stars fall, I mean?"   
  
"Yes. It's not all that complicated. It has to do with balance. The world needs a certain weight to keep it turning. When it starts to slow down, a few nearby stars fall. Their weight makes up the difference."   
  
"I never thought of that."   
  
"Neither did I - not for quite some time."   
  
"The stone you mentioned. Was it-"   
  
"The Ward," Wolf confirmed. "Just an ordinary rock until my Master touched it. Anyway, I learned the secret of the Essence and the Will which isn't really that much of a secret, after all. It's there in all of us or did I say that before?"   
  
"I think so."   
  
"Probably so. I tend to repeat myself." The old man picked up a roll of parchment and glanced at it, then laid it aside again. "So much that I started and haven't finished." He sighed.   
  
"Grandfather?"   
  
"Yes, Shtu-roll?"   
  
"This - thing of ours - how much can you actually do with it?"   
  
"That depends on your mind, Steven. The complexity of it lies in the complexity of the mind that puts it to use. Quite obviously, it can't do something that can't be imagined by the mind that focuses it. That was the purpose of our studies - to expand our minds so that we could use the power more fully."   
  
"Everybody's mind is different, though." Steven was struggling toward an idea.   
  
"Yes."   
  
"Wouldn't that mean that - this thing-" He shied away from the word " _ power _ ." "What I mean is, is it different? Sometimes you do things, and other times you have Aunt Pearl do them."   
  
Wolf nodded. "It's different in each one of us. There are certain things we can all do. We can all move things, for example."   
  
"Aunt Pearl called it trans-" Steven hesitated, not remembering the word.   
  
" **_Translocation_ ** ," Wolf supplied. "Moving something from one place to another. It's the simplest thing you can do - usually the thing you do first - and it makes the most noise."   
  
"That's what she told me." Steven remembered the slave he had jerked from the river at Echelon-- the slave who had died.   
  
"Pearl can do things that I can't," Wolf continued. "Not because she's any stronger than I am, but because she thinks differently than I do. We're not sure how much you can do yet, because we don't know exactly how your mind works. You seem to be able to do certain things quite easily that I wouldn't even attempt. Maybe it's because you don't realize how difficult they are."   
  
"I don't quite understand what you mean."   
  
The old man looked at him. "Perhaps you don't, at that. Remember the crazy monk who tried to attack you in that village in northern Shwar just after we left Flaxia?"   
  
Steven nodded.   
  
"You cured his madness. That doesn't sound like much until you realize that in the instant you cured him, you had to understand fully the nature of his insanity. That's an extremely difficult thing, and you did it without even thinking about it. And then, of course, there was the colt."   
  
Steven glanced down through the window at the little horse friskily running through the field surrounding the tower.   
  
"The colt was dead, but you made him start to breathe. In order for you to do that, you had to be able to understand death."   
  
"It was just a wall," Steven explained. "All I did was reach through it."   
  
"There's more to it than that, I think. What you seem to be able to do is to visualize extremely difficult ideas in very simple terms. That's a rare gift, but there are some dangers involved in it that you should be aware of."   
  
"Dangers? Such as what?"   
  
"Don't oversimplify. If a man's dead, for example, he's usually dead for a very good reason - like a sword through the heart. If you bring him back, he'll only die immediately again anyway. As I said before, just because you can do something doesn't necessarily mean that you should."   
  
Steven sighed. "I'm afraid this is going to take a very long time, Grandfather," he said. "I have to learn how to keep myself under control; I have to learn what I can't do, so I don't kill myself trying to do something impossible; I have to learn what I can do and what I should do. I wish this had never happened to me."   
  
"We all do sometimes," the old man told him. "The decision wasn't ours to make, though. I haven't always liked some of the things I've had to do, and neither has your Aunt; but what we're doing is more important than we are, so we do what's expected of us - like it or not."   
  
"What if I just said, 'No. I won't do it'?"   
  
"You could do that, I suppose, but you won't, will you?"   
  
Steven sighed again. "No," he said, "I guess not."   
  
The old sorcerer put his arm around the boy's shoulders. "I thought you might see things that way, Starlight. You're bound to this the same way we all are."   
  
The strange thrill he always felt at the sound of his other, secret name ran through Steven. "Why do you all insist on calling me that?" he asked.   
  
"What, Starlight?" Wolf said mildly. "Oh, that’s a  **_very_ ** long story, Steven. One I’m not quite certain you’re ready to hear.”

  
“Is this going to be another one of those truths you’ll withhold from me until I’m older?”   
  
"Naturally," the old man replied. "All in good time, Steven."   
  
Steven sighed at him. Then a thought occurred. "But I'm not really Starlight yet, am I?"   
  
"Not entirely. You still have a way to go."   
  
"I suppose I'd better get started then." Steven said it with a certain ruefulness. "Since I don't really have any choice."   
  
"Somehow I knew that eventually you'd come around," Mister Wolf said.   
  
"Don't you sometimes wish that I was just Steven again, and you were the old storyteller coming to visit Alger's farm - with Aunt Pearl making supper in the kitchen as she did in the old days - and we were hiding under a haystack with a bottle I'd stolen for you?" Steven felt the homesickness welling up in him.   
  
"Sometimes, Steven, sometimes," Wolf admitted, his eyes far away.   
  
"We won't ever be able to go back there again, will we?"   
  
"Not the same way, no."   
  
"I'll be Starlight, and you'll be Gregarion. We won't even be the same people any more."   
  
"Everything changes, Steven." Greg told him. “But in little ways, some things stay.”   
  
"Show me the rock," Steven said suddenly.   
  
"Which rock?"   
  
"The one Grey Diamond made you move - the day you first discovered the power."   
  
"Oh," Greg blinked, " **_that_ ** rock. It's right over there - the white one. The one the colt's sharpening his hooves on."   
  
"It's a very big rock."   
  
"I'm glad you appreciate that," Gregarion replied modestly. "I thought so myself."   
  
"Do you suppose I could move it?"   
  
"You never know until you try, Steven," Greg told him.   



	12. A Grey Letter Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He's met Green. He's faced Blue. But now, present in mind and in body, he faces the full presence of a God.

**THE NEXT MORNING** when Steven awoke, he knew immediately that he was not alone.   
  
"Where have you been?" he asked silently.   
  
" _I've been watching,_ " the other consciousness in his mind said. " _I see that you've finally come around._ "   
  
"What choice did I have?"   
  
" _None. You'd better get up. She’s coming._ "

 

“What? Who’s coming?”

 

“ **_Grey Diamond.”_ **   
  
Steven quickly rolled out of his blankets. "Here? Are you sure?" The voice in his mind didn't answer.   
  
Steven put on a clean tunic and hose and wiped off his half boots with a certain amount of care. Then he went out of the tent he shared with V and Bismuth.

 

\---------------------------------------------------  
  
The sun was just coming up over the high mountains to the east, and the line between sunlight and shadow moved with a stately ponderousness across the dewy grass of the Vale. Aunt Pearl and Mister Wolf stood near the small fire where a pot was just beginning to bubble. They were talking quietly, and Steven joined them.   
  
"You're up early," Aunt Pearl said. She reached out and smoothed his hair.   
  
"I was awake," he replied. He looked around, wondering from which direction Grey would come.   
  
"Your grandfather tells me that the two of you had a long talk yesterday."   
  
Steven nodded. "I understand a few things a little better now. I'm sorry I've been so difficult."   
  
She drew him to her and put her arms around him. "It's all right, dear. You had some hard decisions to make."   
  
"You're not angry with me, then?"   
  
"Of course not, dear."   
  
The others had begun to get up, coming out of their tents, yawning and stretching and rumpled-looking.   
  
"What do we do today?" V asked, coming to the fire and rubbing the sleep from her eyes.   
  
"We wait," Greg told him. "My Master said she'd meet us here."   
  
"I'm curious to see her. I've never met a Diamond before."   
  
"Well, you’re about to," Jasper said. "Look over there."   
  
Coming across the meadow not far from the great tree beneath which they had pitched their tents, a figure in a light, grey robe was approaching. A soft, radiant nimbus of light surrounded the figure, and the immediate sense of presence made it instantly clear that what approached was not a mere mortal being. Steven, and indeed everyone on that hill with him, was not prepared for the impact of that presence.

His meeting with the Spirit of Green Diamond in Queen Holly's throne room had been clouded by the narcotic effects of the things the Serpent Queen had forced him to drink. Similarly, half his mind had slept during the confrontation with Blue in the ruins of La Zuli. But now, fully awake in the first light of morning, he found himself well and fully in the presence of a Diamond.  
  
Grey's face was angular, yet soft. Her expression looked kindly yet enormously wise. Her long hair flowed like a gentle cresting river off her shoulders and gleamed white with the soft incandescent radiance of captured starlight-- from conscious choice, Steven felt, rather than from any result of age.

The face was very familiar to him somehow. From sight alone, it was impossible to tell if Grey Diamond was man or woman, for her form bore no distinguishing features. Yet, it bore a startling resemblance to Gregarion's, but Steven perceived immediately, with a sudden curious inversion of his original notion, that it was Gregarion who resembled Grey - as if their centuries of association had stamped Grey's features upon the face of the old man. There were differences, of course. That certain mischievous roguishness was not present on the calm face of Grey. That quality was Greg's own, the last remnant, perhaps, of the face of the thieving boy Grey had taken into her tower on a snowy day some seven thousand years ago.  
  
"Master," Gregarion said, bowing respectfully as Grey approached.   
  
"My son," said Grey Diamond, her voice was very quiet. "I have not seen you in some time. The years haven’t been unkind to you."   
  
Gregarion shrugged wryly. "Some days I feel them more than others, Master. I carry a great number of years with me."   
  
Grey smiled and turned to Aunt Pearl. "Oh, daughter mine," she said fondly, reaching out to touch the white lock at her brow. "You are as lovely as ever."   
  
"And you as kind, Master," she replied, smiling and inclining her head.   
  
There passed among the three of them a kind of intensely personal linkage, a joining of minds that marked their reunion. Steven could feel the edges of it with his own mind, and he was somewhat wistful at being excluded - though he realized at once that there was no intent to exclude him. They were merely re-establishing an eons-old companionship - shared experiences that stretched back into antiquity.   
  
Grey then turned to look at the others. "And so you have come together at last, as it was foretold by the sapphires of old. You are the instruments of creation, and my blessing goes with each as you move toward that awful destiny when the universe will become one again."   
  
The faces of Steven's companions were both awed and puzzled by Grey Diamond's enigmatic blessing. Each, however, bowed with profound respect and humility.   
  
And then Connie emerged from the tent she shared with Aunt Pearl. The tiny girl stretched luxuriantly and ran her fingers through the tumbled mass of her hazelnut hair. She was dressed in a Dryad tunic and sandals.   
  
"Connie," Aunt Pearl called her, "come here."   
  
"Yes, Lady Polina," the little princess replied obediently. She crossed to the fire, her feet seeming barely to touch the ground. Then she saw Grey Diamond standing with the others and stopped, her eyes wide.   
  
"This is our Master, Connie," Aunt Pearl told her. "She wanted to meet you."   
  
The princess stared at the glowing presence in confusion. Nothing in her life had prepared her for such a meeting. She lowered her eyelashes and then looked up shyly, her tiny face artfully and automatically assuming its most appealing expression.   
  
Grey smiled in gentle amazement. "She's like a flower that charms without knowing it." Her eyes looked deeply into those of the princess. "But in this flower, I sense steel. She is fit for her task. My blessings upon you, my child."   
  
Connie responded with an instinctively graceful curtsey. It was the first time Steven had ever seen her bow to anyone.   
  
Grey turned then to look full at Steven. A brief, unspoken acknowledgment passed between the God and the consciousness that shared Steven's thoughts. There was in that momentary meeting a sense of mutual respect and of shared responsibility. And then Steven felt the massive touch of Grey Diamond's mind upon his own and knew that the God had instantly seen and understood his every thought and feeling.   
  
"Starlight, I greet you," Grey Diamond said gravely.   
  
"Master," Steven replied. He dropped to one knee, not really knowing why.   
  
"We have awaited your coming since time's beginning. Upon you lies the hope of all goodly folk." Grey Diamond raised her hand. "My blessing, Starlight. I am gladdened that you are finally here."   
  
Steven's entire being was suffused with love and gratitude as the warmth of Grey Diamonds benediction filled him.   
  
"Dear Polina," Grey Diamond said to Aunt Pearl, "your gift to us is beyond value. The Starlight has come at last, and the world trembles at his coming."   
  
“He comes from the line of my sister, Master, not me.” Aunt Pearl said softly.

 

“Ah, but he has grown, nurtured and beloved by your grace, was he not?” Grey replied, smiling kindly. “My daughter, you are every bit the mother I knew you would be. Be proud of your achievement.”

 

Aunt Pearl stoically bowed, but a slight tremble at the corners of her lips gave away her joy.  
  
"Let us now go apart," Grey said to Greg and Aunt Pearl. "Your task is well begun, and I must now provide you with that instruction I promised when first I set your steps upon this path. That which was once clouded becomes clearer, and we now can see what lies before us. Let us look toward that day we have all awaited and make our preparations."   
  
The three of them moved away from the fire, and it seemed to Steven that, as they went, the glowing nimbus which had surrounded Grey Diamond now enclosed Aunt Pearl and his grandfather as well. Some movement or sound distracted his eye for a moment, and when he looked back, the three had vanished.   
  
Amethyst let out her breath explosively. "Oh my stars! Did you guys see that? Tell me it wasn’t just me!"   
  
"We have been favoured, I think, beyond all men," Jasper said. They all stood staring at each other, caught up in the wonder of what they had just witnessed.   
  
Connie, however, broke the mood.

 

"All right," she ordered peremptorily, "don't just stand there gaping. Move away from the fire."  
  
"What are you going to do?" Steven asked her.   
  
"The Lady Polina's going to be busy," the little girl said loftily, "so I'm going to make breakfast." She moved toward the fire with a businesslike bustling.

 

\------------  
  
The bacon was not too badly burned, but Connie's attempt to toast slices of bread before the open fire turned out disastrously, and her porridge had lumps in it as solid as clods in a sun-baked field. Steven and the others, however, ate what she offered without comment, prudently avoiding the direct gaze she leveled at them, as if daring them to speak so much as one word of criticism.   
  
"I wonder how long they're going to be," V mused after breakfast.

 

"Yeah, does time even have meaning to a Diamond?" Amethyst wondered. "I mean, I’m a gem, so it doesn’t matter to me either but, between us and them? **_Whole_ ** world of difference."   
  
"I-I’m gonna go check on the horses," Ruby stammered, obviously shaken. "Some of them have picked up a few burrs along the way, and I'd like to have a look at their hooves - just to be on the safe side."   
  
"I'll help you," Bismuth offered, getting up.   
  
Ruby nodded, and the two went off to the place where the horses were picketed.   
  
"And I've got a nick or two in one of the tails of my whip," Amethyst remembered, fishing a piece of polishing stone out of her belt and summoning her weapon.   
  
Jasper went to his tent and brought out his armor. He laid it out on the ground and began a minute inspection for dents and spots of rust.   
  
V rattled a pair of dice hopefully in one hand, looking pleadingly at Amethyst.   
  
"Hah, not a chance, Viddy. I’ll hold on to my money thank you very much." the big gem told her.   
  
"Argh, this whole place absolutely reeks of domesticity," V complained. Then she sighed, put away her dice, and went to fetch a needle and thread to sew up a tunic she'd torn on a bush up in the mountains.   


\-----------

  
Connie had returned to her communion with the vast tree and was scampering among the branches, taking what Steven felt to be inordinate risks as she jumped from limb to limb with a catlike unconcern. After watching her for a few moments, he fell into a kind of reverie, thinking back to the awesome meeting that morning.

He had met the Gods Green and Blue already, but there was something special about Grey. The affinity Gregarion and Aunt Pearl showed so obviously for this God who had always remained so aloof from both men and gem alike spoke loudly to Steven. The devotional activities of Delmarvia, where he had been raised, were inclusive rather than exclusive. A good Delmar prayed impartially, and honored all the Diamonds - even Black. Steven now, however, felt a special closeness and reverence for Grey, and the adjustment in his theological thinking required a certain amount of thought.  
  
A twig dropped out of the tree onto his head, and he glanced up with annoyance.   
  
Connie, grinning impishly, was directly over his head.

" **_Boy,_ ** " she said in her most superior and insulting tone, "the breakfast dishes are getting cold. The grease is going to be difficult to wash off if you let it harden."   
  
"I'm not your scullion," he told her.   
  
"Wash the dishes, **_Steven,_ ** " she ordered him, nibbling at the tip of a lock of hair.   
  
"Wash them **_yourself._ ** "   
  
She glared down at him, biting rather savagely at the unoffending lock.   
  
"Why do you keep chewing on your hair like that?" he asked irritably.   
  
"What are you talking about?" she demanded, removing the lock from between her teeth.   
  
"Every time I look at you, you've got your hair stuck in your mouth."   
  
"I do **_not,_ ** " she retorted indignantly.   
  
"Are you going to wash the dishes?"   
  
" **_No._ ** "   
  
He squinted up at her. The short Dryad tunic she was wearing seemed to expose an unseemly amount of leg. "Why don't you go put on some clothes?" he suggested. "Some of us don't appreciate the way you run around half naked all the time."   
  
The fight got under way almost immediately after that.   
  
Finally Steven gave up his efforts to get in the last word and stamped away in disgust.   
  
" **_Steven!_ ** " she screamed after him. " _Don't you_ **_dare_ ** _go off and leave me with all these dirty dishes!_ **_Steeeeveeeeeeen!_ ** "   
  
He ignored her and kept walking.   
  
After a short distance, he felt a familiar nuzzling at his elbow and he rather absently scratched the colt's ears. The small animal quivered with delight and rubbed against him affectionately. Then, unable to restrain himself any more, the colt galloped off into the meadow to pester a family of docilely feeding rabbits. Steven found himself smiling. The morning was just too beautiful to allow the squabble with the princess to spoil it.   


\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  
There was, it seemed, something rather special about the Vale. The world around grew cold with the approach of winter and was buffeted by storms and dangers, but here it seemed as if the hand of Grey Diamond stretched protectively above them, filling this special place with warmth and peace and a kind of eternal and magical serenity. Steven, at this trying point in his life, needed all the warmth and peace he could get. There were things that had to be worked out, and he needed a time, however brief, without storms and dangers to deal with them.   
  
He was halfway to Gregarion's tower before he realized that it had been there that he had been going all along. The tall grass was wet with dew, and his boots were soon soaked, but even that did not spoil the day.   
  
He walked around the tower several times, gazing up at it. Although he found the stone that marked the door quite easily, he decided not to open it. It would not be proper to go uninvited into the old man's tower; and beyond that, he was not entirely certain that the door would respond to any voice but Gregarion's.   
  
He stopped quite suddenly at that last thought and started searching back, trying to find the exact instant when he had ceased to think of his grandfather as Mister Wolf and had finally accepted the fact that he was Gregarion. The changeover seemed significant - a kind of turning point.   
  
Still lost in thought, he turned then and walked across the meadow toward the large, white rock the old man had pointed out to him from the tower window. Absently he put one hand on it and pushed. The rock didn't budge.   
  
Steven set both hands on it and pushed again, but the rock remained motionless. He stepped back and considered it. It wasn't really a vast boulder. It was rounded and white and not quite as high as his waist heavy, certainly, but it should not be so inflexibly solid. He bent over to look at the bottom, and then he understood. The underside of the rock was flat. It would never roll. The only way to move it would be to lift one side and tip it over. He walked around the rock, looking at it from every angle. He judged that it was marginally movable. If he exerted every ounce of his strength, he might be able to lift it. He sat down and looked at it, thinking hard. As he sometimes did, he talked to himself, trying to lay out the problem.   
  
"The first thing to do is to try to move it," he concluded. "It doesn't really look totally impossible. Then, if that doesn't work, we'll try it the other way."   
  
He stood up, stepped purposefully to the rock, wormed his fingers under the edge of it and heaved. Nothing happened.   
  
"Have to try a little harder," he told himself. He spread his feet and set himself. He began to lift again, straining, the cords standing out in his neck. For the space of about ten heartbeats he tried as hard as he could to lift the stubborn rock - not to roll it over; he'd given that up after the first instant - but simply to make it budge, to acknowledge his existence. Though the ground was not particularly soft there, his feet actually sank a fraction of an inch or so as he strained against the rock's weight.   
  
His head was swimming, and little dots seemed to swirl in front of his eyes as he released the rock and collapsed, gasping, against it. He lay against the cold, gritty surface for several minutes, recovering.   
  
"All right," he said finally, "now we know that that won't work." He stepped back and sat down.   
  
Each time he'd done something with his mind before, it had been on impulse, a response to some crisis. He had never sat down and deliberately worked himself up to it. He discovered almost at once that the entire set of circumstances was completely different. The whole world seemed suddenly filled with distractions. Birds sang. A breeze brushed his face. An ant crawled across his hand. Each time he began to bring his will to bear, something pulled his attention away.   
  
There was a certain feeling to it, he knew that, a tightness in the back of his head and a sort of pushing out with his forehead. He closed his eyes, and that seemed to help. It was coming. It was slow, but he felt the will begin to build in him. Remembering something, he reached inside his tunic and put the mark on his palm against the amulet. The force within him, amplified by that touch, built to a great roaring crescendo. He kept his eyes closed and stood up. Then he opened his eyes and looked hard at the stubborn white rock.

  
" **_You will move,_ ** " he muttered. He kept his right hand on the amulet and held out his left hand, palm up.   
  
" **_Now!_ ** " he said sharply and slowly began to raise his left hand in a lifting motion. The force within him surged, and the roaring sound inside his head became deafening.   
  
Slowly the edge of the rock came up out of the grass. Worms and burrowing grubs who had lived out their lives in the safe, comfortable darkness under the rock flinched as the morning sunlight hit them. Ponderously, the rock raised, obeying Steven's inexorably lifting hand. It teetered for a second on its edge, then toppled slowly over.   
  
The exhaustion he had felt after trying to lift the rock with his back was nothing compared to the bone-deep weariness that swept over him after he let the clenching of his will relax. He folded his arms on the grass and let his head sink down on them.   
  
After a moment or two, that peculiar fact began to dawn on him. He was still standing, but his arms were folded comfortably in front of him on the grass. He jerked his head up and looked around in confusion. He had moved the rock, certainly. That much was obvious, since the rock now lay on its rounded top with its damp underside turned up. Something else had also happened, however. Though he had not touched the rock, its weight had nonetheless been upon him as he had lifted it, and the force he had directed at it had not all gone at the rock.   
  
With dismay, Steven realized that he had sunk up to his armpits in the firm soil of the meadow.   
  
"Now what do I do?" he asked himself helplessly. He shuddered away from the idea of once again mustering his will to pull himself out of the ground. He was too exhausted even to consider it. He tried to wriggle, thinking that he might be able to loosen the earth around him and work his way up an inch at a time, but he could not so much as budge.   
  
"Look what you've done," he accused the rock. The rock ignored him.   
  
A thought occurred to him. " _Are you in there?_ " he asked that awareness that seemed always to have been with him.   
  
The silence in his mind was profound. "Help!" he shouted.   
  
A bird, attracted by the exposed worms and bugs that had been under the rock, cocked one eye at him and then went back to its breakfast. Steven heard a light step behind him and craned around, trying to see. The colt was staring at him in amazement. Hesitantly, the small horse thrust out his nose and nuzzled Steven's face.   
  
"Good horse," Steven said, relieved not to be alone, at least. An idea came to him. "You're going to have to go get Ruby," he told the colt. The colt pranced about and nuzzled his face again.   
  
"Stop that," Steven commanded. "This is serious." Cautiously, he tried to push his mind into the colt's thoughts. He tried a dozen different ways until he finally struck the right combination by sheer accident. The colt's mind flitted from here to there without purpose or pattern. It was a baby's mind, vacant of thought, receiving only sense impressions. Steven caught flickering images of green grass and running and clouds in the sky and warm milk. He also felt the sense of wonder in the little mind, and the abiding love the colt had for him.   
  
Slowly, painfully, Steven began constructing a picture of Ruby in the colt's wandering thoughts. It seemed to take forever.   
  
"Ruby," Steven said over and over. "Go get Ruby. Tell her that I'm in trouble."   
  
The colt scampered around and came back to stick his soft nose in Steven's ear.   
  
"Please pay attention," Steven cried. " **_Please!_ ** "   
  
Finally, after what seemed hours, the colt seemed to understand. He went several paces away, then came back to nuzzle Steven again. " _Go-get-Ruby,_ " Steven ordered, stressing each word.   
  
The colt pawed at the ground, then turned and galloped away - going in the wrong direction. Steven started to swear. For almost a year now he had been exposed to some of the more colorful parts of Amethyst's vocabulary. After he had repeated all the phrases he remembered six or eight times, he began to extemporize.   
  
A flickering thought came back to him from the now-vanished colt. The little beast was chasing butterflies. Steven pounded the ground with his fists, wanting to howl with frustration.   
  
The sun rose higher, and it started to get hot.   
  
It was early afternoon when Ruby and Vidalia, following the prancing little colt, found him.   
  
"Now how **_on earth_ ** did you manage to do that?" Vidalia asked curiously.   
  
"I don't want to talk about it," Steven muttered, somewhere between relief and total embarrassment.   
  
"He probably can do many things that we can't," Ruby observed, climbing down from her horse and untying Bismuth 's shovel from her saddle. "The thing I can't understand, though, is **_why_ ** he'd want to do it.   
  
"I'm positive he had a good reason for it," V assured her. "Do you think we should ask him?"   
  
"It's probably very complicated," Ruby replied. "I'm sure simple people like you and me wouldn't be able to understand it."   
  
"Do you suppose he's finished with whatever it is he's doing?"   
  
"We could ask him, I suppose."   
  
"I wouldn't want to disturb him though," Ruby said. "It could be very important."   
  
"It almost has to be," V agreed.   
  
"Will you please get me out of here?" Steven begged.   
  
"Are you sure you're finished?" V asked politely. "We can wait if you're not done yet."   
  
" **_Please,_ **" Steven asked, on the verge of tears.


	13. Intermission I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I've already been away a while, but I wanted to explain exactly why.

**Hiya folks!**

**I know, I know, this is, by my standards at least, a VERY early time in the fic to take a break.**

**I'm sorry. I've just been possessed by so many ideas lately. The next chapter in this fic is already complete, but I've been reading and re-reading it and I don't know, but I find myself increasingly dissatisfied with it. Maybe it doesn't gel with the story flow. Maybe it's because I'm trying to include new characters and I'm not happy with the way I've characterised them. Whatever the case, it's safe to say that this next hiatus I'm taking is a complicated one, to be certain.**

**Also, I've got another fic in the works as well. A vignette-focused fic, inspired by the other fics I've been reading in my downtime such as starstrucksea's "I'd Promise You Anything For Another Shot At Life" (Interesting concept here, by the way, go give her fic a hit) and more poignantly, CompletelyDifferent's 'Little Rebellions'. An absolute masterpiece of a vignette fic, and one I've been trying to analyse for the better part of two weeks now.**

**So between reworking on this and planning on the next, I'm going to be quite busy, and I've no idea how long I'm going to take. It could be tomorrow, it could be a week from now. I'm simply not sure. This is unaided by the fact that I'm going to have to incorporate new canon ideas from the Diamond Days special event that's going to take place in the next few weeks. Arghhhhh.**

**I'm sorry my dears. I know that if you've made it this far, then you really are gunning for more of the story, and I really, really do want to oblige you. Believe me, there's nothing I'd like more than for Steven's journey to continue, but I think, just like Steven, I've got wayyy too much on my mind right now to think straight. I'm sinking right into the quagmire of my muddied thoughts, and I need a while to sort myself out.**

**But know this, dear reader. I adore you. And I promise you won't have to wait long for the next part. Until then, I'll see you soon!**


	14. Extended Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Under the watchful eye of Grey, the group rests easy. Steven meets the other members of his fraternity of sorcerers, and learns a little more about his powers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gooooood evening everybody!
> 
> This is the lovely VanillaSkyce, coming to you a-live, from the soon to be former hiatus-ridden hub.  
> How are y'all doing tonight :)
> 
> I'm back everyone! I know you missed me ;) I've finally got this chapter out, and though it was rough around the edges, I think I'm satisfied enough to release it. The next few chapters have also been written, though I'm stockpiling them so as to keep the story fresh. I hope to include some new, old faces soon, so I'm really excited to start speeding this along.

" **I CAN'T EVEN BEGIN** to comprehend your thought process here. Why did you try to lift it?” Greg asked Steven the next morning after he and Aunt Pearl had returned and Vidalia and Ruby had solemnly informed them of the predicament in which they had found the young man the afternoon before.

"It just… seemed like the best way to tip it over,” Steven answered. "You know, kind of get hold of it from underneath and then roll it-- sort of."

"Why didn't you just push against it - close to the top? It would have rolled over if you'd done it that way."

"I didn't think of that."

"Didn't you realize that soft earth wouldn't accept that kind of pressure?" Aunt Pearl asked.

"Well, I do now," Steven replied. "But wouldn't pushing on it have just moved me backward?"

"You have to brace yourself, Shtu-roll," Greg explained. "That's part of the whole trick. As much of your will goes to holding yourself immobile as it does to pushing against the object you're trying to move. Otherwise all you do is just shove yourself away."

"I didn't know that," Steven admitted. "It's the first time I've ever tried to do anything unless it was an emergenc-- _Will you_ **_stop_ ** _that?"_ he demanded crossly of Connie, who had collapsed into fits of laughter as soon as V had finished telling them about Steven’s blunder.

But her laughter only intensified, much to Steven's ire.

"I think you're going to have to explain a few things to him, Greg," Aunt Pearl said. "He doesn't seem to have even the most rudimentary idea about the way forces react against each other." She looked at Steven critically. "It's lucky you didn't decide to throw it," she told him. "You might have thrown yourself halfway back to Lanzalore."

"I really don't think it's all that funny," Steven told his friends, who were all grinning openly at him. "This isn't as easy as it looks, you know." He realized that he had just made a fool of himself and he was not sure if he were more embarrassed or hurt by their amusement.

"Come with me, Shtu-roll," Greg said firmly. "It looks as if we're going to have to start at the very beginning."

"It's not my fault I didn't know," Steven protested. "You should have told me."

"I didn't know you were planning to start experimenting so **_soon_ **," the old man replied. "Most of us have sense enough to wait for guidance before we start rearranging local geography."

"Well, at least I **_did_ ** manage to move it," Steven said defensively as he followed the old man across the meadow toward the tower.

"Well, yes, that's all well and good. Did you put it back the way you found it?"

"Wait what? Why? What difference does it make?"

"We don't move things here in the Vale. Everything that's here is here for a reason, and they're all supposed to be exactly where they are."

"I didn't know," Steven apologized.

"You do now. Let's go put it back where it belongs." They trudged along in silence.

"Grandfather?" Steven said finally.

"Yes?"

"When I moved the rock, it seemed that I was getting the strength to do it from all around me. It seemed just to flow in from everyplace. Does that mean anything?"

"That's the way it works," Greg explained. "When we do something, we take the power to do it from our surroundings. When you burned Bloodstone, for example, you drew the heat from all around you - from the air, from the ground, and from everyone who was in the area. You drew a little heat from everything to build the fire. When you tipped the rock over, you took the force to do it from everything nearby."

"I thought it all came from inside."

"Only when you **_create_ ** things," the old man replied. "That force has to come from within us. For anything else, we borrow. We gather up a little power from here and there and put it all together and then turn it loose all at one spot. Nobody's big enough to carry around the kind of force it would take to do even the simplest sort of thing."

"Then that's what happens when somebody tries to unmake something," Steven said intuitively. "He pulls in all the force, but then he can't let it go, and it just " He spread his hands and jerked them suddenly apart.

Greg looked narrowly at him. "You've got a strange sort of mind, Steven. You understand the difficult things quite easily, but you can't seem to get hold of the simple ones. There's the rock." He shook his head. "That will never do. Put it back where it belongs, and try not to make so much noise this time. That racket you raised yesterday echoed all over the Vale."

"What do I do?" Steven asked.

"Gather in their essence," Greg told him. "Take it from everything around."

Steven tried that.

" ** _Wha--_** **_Not from me!"_** the old man exclaimed sharply.

Steven excluded his grandfather from his field of reaching out and pulling in, smiling sheepishly. After a moment or two, he felt as if he were tingling all over and that his hair was standing on end.

"Now what?" he asked, clenching his teeth to hold it in.

"Push out behind you and push at the rock at the same time.''

"What do I push at behind me?"

"Everything - and at the rock as well. It has to be simultaneous."

"Won't I get - sort of squeezed in between?"

"Tense yourself up."

"We'd better hurry, Grandfather," Steven said. "I feel like I'm going to fly apart."

"Hold it in. Now put your will on the rock, and do your thing." Steven put his hands out in front of him and straightened his arms. " _Push,_ " he commanded. He felt the surge and the roaring.

With a resounding thud, the rock teetered and then rolled back smoothly to where it had been the morning before. Steven suddenly felt bruised all over, and he sank to his knees in exhaustion.

" **_Push?_ **" Greg said incredulously.

"You said to say push."

"I said to push. I didn't say to say push."

"It went over. What difference does it make what word I used?"

"It's a question of style," the old man said with a pained look. "Push sounds so… so babyish."

At being so unexpectedly chastised over something so trivial, Steven couldn’t help it. He began to laugh.

"After all, Steven, we do have a certain dignity to maintain," the old man said loftily. "If we go around saying _'_ **_push_ ** _'_ or _'_ **_flop_ ** _'_ or things like that, no one's ever going to take us seriously."

Steven wanted to stop laughing, but he simply couldn't. Greg stalked away indignantly, muttering to himself.

 

\-------------------------------------------------

 

When they returned to the others, they found that the tents had been struck and the packhorses loaded.

"There's no point in staying here," Aunt Pearl told them, "and the others are waiting for us. Did you manage to make him understand anything, Greg?"

Greg grunted, his face set in an expression of profound disapproval.

"Things didn't go well, I take it."

"I'll explain later," he said shortly.

During Steven’s absence, Connie, with much coaxing and a lapful of apples from their stores, had seduced the little colt into a kind of ecstatic subservience.

He followed her about shamelessly, and the rather distant look he gave Steven showed not the slightest trace of guilt.

"You're going to make him sick," Steven accused her.

"Apples are good for horses," she replied airily.

"But that's too much! Tell her, Ruby," Steven said.

"They won't hurt him," the cherubic-faced woman answered, gazing lovingly at the colt. "It's a customary way to gain the trust of a young horse."

Steven tried to think of another suitable objection, but without success. For some reason the sight of the little animal nuzzling at Connie offended him, though he couldn't exactly put his finger on why.

"Who are these others, Greg?" V asked as they rode. "The ones Lady Pearl mentioned."

"My sisters," the old sorcerer replied. "Our Master's advised them that we're coming."

"I've heard stories about the Fraternity of Sorcerers all my life. Are they as remarkable as everyone says?"

"I think you're in for a bit of a surprise," Aunt Pearl told him rather primly. "Most people tend to think sorcerers to be crotchety old men with a wide assortment of bad habits," she went on, throwing a sidelong glance at Greg. “But they couldn't be farther from the truth.”

She turned her face to the thrush perched on her shoulder, singing adoringly.

"Yes," she said to the bird, "I know."

 

\-----------------

 

Steven pulled closer to his Aunt and began to listen very hard to the birdsong. At first it was merely noise-- pretty, but without sense.

Then, gradually, he began to pick up scraps of meaning - a bit here, a bit there. The bird was singing of nests and small, speckled eggs and sunrises and the overwhelming joy of flying. Then, as if his ears had suddenly opened, Steven began to understand.

Larks sang of flying and singing. Sparrows chirped of hidden little pockets of seeds. A hawk, soaring overhead, screamed its lonely song of riding the wind alone and the fierce joy of the kill. Steven was awed as the air around him suddenly came alive with words.

Aunt Pearl looked at him, a small smile upon her face. "It's a beginning," she said without bothering to explain.

Steven was so caught up in the world that had just opened to him that he did not see the two maroon-haired people at first. They stood together beneath a tall tree, waiting as the party rode nearer. They wore identical grey robes, and their crops of maroon hair were neat and flat at the top.

When Steven looked at them for the first time, he thought for a moment that his eyes were playing tricks. The two were so absolutely identical that it was impossible to tell them apart.

"Gareg! Our brother," one of them said, "it's been such-" "-a terribly long time," the other finished.

"Ru," Greg said warmly. "Tile." He dismounted and embraced the twins.

"Sister!” said one of them to Aunt Pearl. "The Vale has been-" the other started.

"-so empty without you," the second completed. she turned to her sister. "That was very poetic," she said admiringly.

"Thank you," the first replied modestly.

"These are my sisters, the Rutile Twins," Greg informed the members of the party who had begun to dismount. "Don't bother to try to keep them separate. Nobody can tell them apart anyway."

" **_We_ ** can," the two sang in unison.

"I'm not even sure of that," Greg responded with a gentle smile. "Our Master separated your bodies eons ago but… your minds are so close together, I don’t even think **_you_ ** can tell yourselves apart."

"You always complicate it so much, Greg," Aunt Pearl said. "This is Ru." She kissed one of the sweet-faced ladies. "And this is Tile." She kissed the other. "I've been able to tell them apart since I was a child."

"Pearl knows-"

"-all our secrets." The twins blushed. "And who are-"

"-your companions?"

"I think you'll recognize them," Greg answered. "Jasper, Baron of I'chir Quartizia."

"The Knight Radiant," the twins said in unison, bowing.

"Princess Vidalia of Q’zarnia."

"The Guide," they said.

"Amethyst, Earl of Crenellan."

"The Purple Puma." They looked at the big Wy-Atian apprehensively. Amethyst’s face darkened, but she said nothing.

"Ruby, daughter of King Evan of Aine."

"The Ruby Rider."

"And Bismuth of Delmarvia"

"The One with Two Lives," they murmured with profound respect. Bismuth looked baffled at that.

"Connie, Imperial Princess of Shwar."

"The Queen of all the World," they replied with another deep bow. Connie laughed nervously.

"And this-"

"-can only be Starlight!" they said, their faces alive with joy, "the Chosen One." The twins reached out in unison and laid their right hands on Steven's head. Their voices sounded within his mind. "Hail, Starlight, overlord and champion, hope of the world."

Steven was too surprised at this strange benediction to do more than awkwardly nod his head.

 

" **_Friends, Ru! Tile! I have received a most wondrous vision!_ ** " a new voice, light and chirpy, announced. “ **_We’re about to be paid a visit by our dearest brother and sister! Polina and Gregarion!_ **”

The speaker, who had just stepped out from behind the shadow of the tree, was a dainty, diminutive little girl, her face shadowed by a short, lustrous crop of tangerine hair that obscured her eyes. Her legs were hidden from sight by a billowing veil, which bloomed like an inverted umbrella over the lower half of her body, making her movements look as though she were gliding over the ground. Her expression was hidden, but what did show was the smallest and sweetest little smile in all the world, matched only by the enthusiasm with which she carried herself.

"Padparadscha," Greg smiled warmly, "we weren't sure you would come."

" **_Paddy!_ **" gasped Aunt Pearl in a most uncharacteristic show of excitement. She rushed forward to embrace the little woman in an all-encompassing hug that quite literally enveloped her entire form. It was a comical sight, to see only her head, smiling with frazzled hair, poking out from within her hug.

After a while, Aunt Pearl pulled back to arms distance to regard her, and they stared mutely at each other for some time, though their facial expressions changed frequently.

Immediately, Steven realised that they were having a mental conversation.

 

"Grandfather," he asked quietly as the others made their acquaintances.

"Yes, Steven?”

“Why must Aunt Pearl talk to her like that? It feels a bit… rude.”

“Rude? In what way?”

“I mean, **_we_ **can hear her, but the rest of them can’t.”

“Ahh,” Greg mused. “Well, you see Steven, Padparadscha isn’t like us. She’s a little slow of speech. It’s the reason for her quaint behaviour. It’s why we prefer to talk to her mentally, because that way, she can converse normally like we do.”

“Slow of speech? But she sounds perfectly fine to me.”

“There’s nothing wrong with her speech pattern, it’s just that she processes sounds slower than we do, so she takes longer to reply to the things we say out loud.”

Steven turned to stare at the two women, looking for all the world like two silent statues, when suddenly Padparadscha stopped, before turning to Greg.

“I **_heard_ **that you know,” said Padparadscha with a slight frown. “It’s not very nice to call someone slow, Greg.”

“I didn’t mean anything by it, Paddy,”

Aunt Pearl turned around then, and if Padparadscha’s expression was sour, hers was withering.

“Are you insinuating that she **_isn’t_ ** normal, Greg?” Aunt Pearl began dangerously.

“Pearl, we’ve had this conversation before. You **_know_ ** that isn’t what I was trying to say.”

“Oh, we’ve had this conversation before alright. But from what **_I_ **just heard I think we’re going to have to have it again.”

“Oh, stars, here we go--”

 

As their argument launched into its opening salvos, Steven jumped when he felt a touch on his right hand. He looked down to find the little orange woman holding his right hand in hers. There on the palm of it was a royal orange gemstone.

“ _Hello,”_ went a voice in his head. “ _You must be Starlight.”_

_“Hi. It’s Steven, actually. I mean-- it’s Starlight too, but I prefer Steven.”_

A giggle from her then. “ _Alright then, Steven.”_

“ _It’s Padparadscha, right?”_

_“Oh, yes! But if you like, you can call me Paddy.”_

_“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Paddy.”_

She simply smiled in response. Steven wondered how much could be conveyed with a simple smile. Aunt Pearl could smile and he would know that she knew all his secrets. Connie could smile and he would feel frustratingly conflicted about it. But Padparadscha’s smile was quite something else entirely. There was a purity in it. A heartfelt innocence that was either untempered or unperturbed by fate’s cruel machinations, and a warmth that could be felt and appreciated by all like a toasty hearth on a cold winter’s night. Steven decided then that she was a person whom he could trust with any of his secrets, and had to be protected at all costs.

“ _Really? Is that really how you feel?_ ”

Steven flushed. “ _Shoot. You heard all that?”_

_“Oh! I apologise! Was I not supposed to?”_

_“I-I didn’t, I mean I didn’t mean t--”_

_“It’s okay, Steven.”_ she said, laughing. “ _That was the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me since Grey Diamond first taught me how to speak like this.”_

Steven blushed, and turned away for a moment.

“ _I’m so glad we could finally meet in person, Steven. Hail to you, Starlight, our champion and saviour of our world.”_

There it was again. That strange benediction which he couldn’t even begin to fathom.

The implication was unsettling.

 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

Dawn soon gave way to day, and, acquaintances made, the more expedient details of their journey came into question.

“ _Pearl,_ ” projected Padparadscha. “ _Would you be my voice and my ears for the purposes of this conversation?”_

 _“Of course, Paddy.”_ replied Aunt Pearl with a smile.

Aunt Pearl's eyes glowed a bright white as she spoke, only when she did, it was with Padparadscha’s voice. Her entire body went rigid and her hands clasped together in a stance not unlike the little orange gem’s, except now Padparadscha herself had fallen supine onto the soft meadowy grass.

“Friends, I have something of the utmost importance to speak to you about!” said the Paddy-Pearl.

"Where have you been?" Greg asked him.

"Central Sivu Isyak. I've been sitting on a hilltop since the Battle of I’chir Gelar, watching the cave where our former brother Andarion took White Diamond."

"Five hundred years?" Vidalia gasped.

Paddy-Pearl shrugged. "More or less," she replied indifferently. "Time means nothing to a gem."

"You said you saw Andy," Greg said.

"Why yes, Greg. He came to the cave and pulled White out. He seemed awfully rushed about it. Then he changed himself into a vulture and flew off with the body."

"That must have been right after Aquamarine caught him at the Olivine border and took the Ward away from him," Greg mused.

"I’m sorry I couldn’t be of better service, Greg. That was part of your responsibility, not mine. All I was supposed to do was keep watch over White. Did any of the ashes fall on you?"

"Ashes?" one of the twins asked.

"When Andy took White out of the cave, the mountain exploded-- spewed it’s insides out. I imagine it had something to do with the force surrounding One-Eye's body. It was still blowing when I left."

"We wondered what had caused the eruption," Greg commented. "It put ash down an inch deep all over Olivia."

"Good.” sneered the Paddy-Pearl. “Too bad it wasn't deeper."

"Did you see any signs-" began Ru.

"-of Black stirring?" finished Tile.

“Not at all! White didn't move once in the whole five hundred years. There was mold on her when Andarion dragged her out of the cave."

"Did you follow him?" Greg asked.

"Naturally."

"Where did he take White?"

"To the ruins of Noxu-Isyak in Noxus of course. There are very few places on earth that will bear White's weight, and that's one of them. Andarion will have to keep Aquamarine and the Ward away from White, and that's the only place he could go. The Noxian Marikeen refuse to accept Aquamarine's authority, so Andy will be safe there. It will cost him a great deal to pay for their aid, but they'll keep Aquamarine out of Noxus-- unless he raises an army of Isyaki and invades."

"There’s something we could hope for," Amy grinned.

 

"Are you going back to Sivu Isyak?" Greg asked.

"No. Our Diamond told me to stay here. The twins and I have work to do and we don't have much time."

"He spoke to-"

"-us, too."

Paddy-Pearl gave them a brief smile. She turned back to Greg. "Are you going to Fy Sivu now?"

"Not yet. We've got to go to Diophe first. I have to talk to the Phenom, and we've yet to pick up another member of the party."

"I noticed that your group wasn't complete yet. What about the last one?"

Greg spread his hands. "That's the one that worries me. I haven't been able to find **_any_ ** trace of **_her_ ** \- and I've been looking for three thousand years."

"I might suggest thinking on a sober head, Greg. Ale dulls the senses."

"What a coincidence, I told him the same thing," Aunt Pearl said with a sweet little smile.

"Where do we go after Diophe?" Amy asked.

"I think that then we'll go to Fy Sivu," Greg replied rather grimly. "We've got to get the Ward back from Aquamarine, and I've been meaning to have a rather pointed discussion with the high priestess of the Isyaki for a long, long time, now."


	15. Into Phenaidia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Vale behind them, the Fellowship leave on a quest to meet the Phenom, and pick up the 2nd last member of their party. Challenges ensue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been... very, very hard, trying to continue this story without feeling burnt out trying to figure out whether or not it's good enough to release.  
> At least this chapter didn't have to deal with any new appearances, so it wasn't as hard to write, but even so, it has to comply to the organic flow of the storyline, else it simply becomes boring, awkward or worse, unreadable.
> 
> To that end, I've been wracking my brain trying to characterise this next arrival to the cast, and out of the two or so odd members of the main cast you haven't seen, no prizes to guessing who comes next :)

**THE FOLLOWING MORNING** they turned northwest and rode toward the stark, white peaks of the mountains of Phenai, glittering in the morning sun above the lush meadows of the Vale.

 

"I don’t wanna be ‘that guy’ but, it looks like the snow’s pretty thick up there," Amethyst observed. "It could be a difficult trip."

"It always is," Ruby grumbled.

"Have any of you been to Diophe before?" Bismuth asked.

"A few times. We keep communications open with the Phenaidians. Our visits are mostly ceremonial."

 

They rode for several days across the Vale and then moved up into the foothills which clustered along the flanks of the ragged peaks that formed the land of the Phenai. 

Once again the seasons changed as they rode. It was early autumn as they crested the first low range, and the valleys beyond were aflame with crimson leaves. At the top of a second, higher range, the trees had been swept bare, and the wind had the first bite of winter in it as it whistled down from the peaks. The sky grew overcast, and tendrils of cloud seeped down the rocky gorges above them. Spits of intermittent snow and rain pelted them as they climbed higher up the rocky slopes.

 

"I suppose we'd better begin keeping an eye out for Myr," V said hopefully one snowy afternoon. "It's about time for him to show up again."

"Not very likely," Greg replied. "Isyaki avoid Phenai-Dia even more than they avoid the Vale. The Phenaidians dislike the Isyaki intensely."

"So do Sangrians."

"Phenaidians can see in the dark, though," the old man told him. "Isyaki who come into these mountains tend not to wake up from their first night's sleep. I don't think we need to worry about Myr."

"Pity," V remarked with a certain disappointment.

"It won't hurt to keep our eyes open, though. There are worse things than just Isyaki in the mountains of Phenaidia."

V scoffed. "Aren't those stories exaggerated?"

"No. Not really."

"The region abounds with monsters, Princess Vidalia," Jasper assured the little woman. "Some years back, a dozen foolish young knights of my acquaintance rode into these mountains to test their bravery and prowess against the unseemly beasts. Not one returned."

 

\--------------------

 

When they crested the next ridge, the full force of a winter gale struck them. Snow, which had grown steadily heavier as they climbed, drove horizontally in the howling wind.

"We'll have to take cover until this blows over, Greg," Amethyst shouted above the wind, fighting to keep her flapping pumaskin cape around her. 

"Let's drop down into this next valley," Greg shouted back, also struggling with his cloak. "The trees down there should break the wind."

They crossed the ridge and angled down toward the pines clustered at the bottom of the basin ahead. Steven pulled his cloak tighter and bowed his head into the shrieking wind.

The thick stand of sapling pine in the basin blocked the force of the gale, but the snow swirled about them as they reined in.

"We're not going to get much farther today, Greg," Amethyst declared, trying to brush the snow out of her beard. "We might as well hole up here and wait for morning."

"What's that?" Bismuth asked sharply, cocking his head to one side.

"The wind," Amy shrugged.

"No.  **_Listen_ ** ."

Above the howling of the wind, a shrill whinnying sound came to them.

"Look there." Ruby pointed.

 

Dimly they saw a dozen horselike animals crossing the ridge behind them. Their shapes were blurred by the thickly falling snow, and their line as they moved seemed almost ghostly. On a rise just above them stood a huge stallion, his mane and tail tossing in the wind. His neigh was almost a shrill scream.

"Dreadsteeds!" Greg said sharply.

"Can we outrun them?" V asked hopefully.

"I doubt it," Greg replied. "Besides, they've got our scent now. They'll dog our trail from here to Diophe if we try to run."

"Then we must teach them to fear our trail and avoid it," Jasper declared, tightening the straps on his shield. His eyes white pinpoints of blazing light.

"You're falling back into your old habits, Jasper," Amethyst observed in a grumpy voice.

Ruby's face had assumed that curiously blank expression it usually did when she was communicating with her horses. She shuddered finally, and her eyes went sick with revulsion.

"Well?" Aunt Pearl asked him.

"They aren't horses," she began.

"We know that, Ruby," she replied. "Can you do anything with them? Frighten them off perhaps?"

He shook his head. "They're hungry, Polina," he told her, "and they have our scent. The herd stallion seems to have much more control over them than he would if they were horses. I might be able to frighten one or two of the weaker ones - if it weren't for him."

"Then we'll have to fight them all," Amy sighed grimly, buckling on her shield.

"I don't think so," Ruby replied, her eyes narrowing. "The key seems to be the stallion. He dominates the whole herd. I think that if we kill him, the rest will turn and run."

"All right," Amy said, "we try for the stallion then."

"We might want to make some kind of noise," Ruby suggested. "Something that sounds like a challenge. That might make him come out to the front to answer it. Otherwise, we'll have to go through the whole herd to get to him."

"Maybe this will provoke him," Jasper said. He lifted his horn to his lips and blew a brassy note of ringing defiance that was whipped away by the gale.

The stallion's shrill scream answered immediately.

"It sounds as if it's working," Amy observed. "Blow it again, Jasper."

Jasper sounded his horn again, and again the stallion shrilled his reply. Then the great beast plunged down from the ridgetop and charged furiously through the herd toward them. When he reached the forefront, he shrieked again and reared up on his hind legs, his front claws flashing in the snowy air.

"That did it," Amy barked. "Let's go!" She jammed her spurs home, and his big gray leaped forward, spraying snow behind him. Ruby and Jasper swept out to flank her, and the three plunged forward through the thickly falling snow toward the screaming dread stallion. Jasper set his lance as he charged, and a strange sound drifted back on the wind as he thundered toward the advancing Dreadsteed. Jasper was laughing.

 

Steven drew his sword and pulled his horse in front of Aunt Pearl and Connie. He realized that it was probably a futile gesture, but he did it anyway.

Two of the Dreadsteeds, perhaps at the herd stallion's unspoken command, bounded forward to cut off Amy and Jasper while the stallion himself moved to meet Ruby as if recognizing the little red gem as the greatest potential danger to the herd. 

As the first Dreadsteed reared, his fangs bared in a catlike snarl and his clawed feet widespread, Jasper lowered his lance and drove it through the snarling monster's chest. Bloody froth burst from the monster’s mouth, and he toppled over backward, clawing the broken shaft of Jasper’s lance into splinters as he fell.

Amy caught a clawed swipe on her heavy leather bracers and split open the head of the second dreadsteed with a vast overhand swing of her heavy whip. The beast collapsed, his convulsions churning the snow.

Ruby and the herd stallion stalked each other in the swirling snow. They moved warily, circling, their eyes locked on each other with a deadly intensity. 

Suddenly the stallion reared and lunged all in one motion, his great forelegs wide and his claws outspread. But Ruby’s horse, his mind linked with his rider's, danced clear of the furious charge. 

The Dreadsteed spun and charged again, and once again Ruby’s horse jumped to one side. The infuriated stallion screamed his frustration and lunged in, his claws flailing. Ruby's horse sidestepped the enraged beast, then darted in, and Ruby launched herself from her saddle and landed on the stallion's back. Her long, powerful legs locked about the Dreadsteed’s ribs and her right hand gathered a great fistful of the animal's mane.

The stallion went mad as he felt for the first time in the entire history of his species the weight of a rider on his back. He plunged and reared and shrieked, trying to shake Ruby off. The rest of the herd, which had been moving to the attack, faltered and stared in uncomprehending horror at the stallion's wild attempts to dislodge his rider. Jasper and Amethyst reined in, dumbfounded, as Ruby rode the raging stallion in circles through the blizzard. Then, grimly, almost sadly, she produced a long, sharp dagger from her gem. She knew horses, and she knew where to strike.

 

Her first thrust was lethal. The churned snow turned red. The stallion reared one last time, screaming and with blood pouring out of his mouth, and then he dropped back to stand on shuddering legs. Slowly his knees buckled and he toppled to one side. Ruby jumped clear.

The herd of Dreadsteeds turned and fled, squealing, back into the blizzard.

Ruby grimly cleaned her dagger in the snow and let it disappear. Briefly she laid one hand on the dead stallion's neck, then turned to look through the trampled snow for the cape she had discarded in her wild leap onto the stallion's back.

When the three warriors returned to the shelter of the trees, Jasper and Amethyst were staring at Ruby with a look of profound respect.

"It's a shame they're mad," the smaller gem said with a distant look on her face. "There was a moment just a moment-- when I almost got through to him, and we moved together. Then the madness came back, and I had to kill him. If they could be tamed-" She broke off and shook her head. She sighed and shrugged regretfully.

"You wouldn't actually ride something like that?" Bismuth's voice was shocked.

"I've never had an animal like that under me," Ruby said quietly. "I don't think I'll ever forget what it was like." She turned and walked some distance away and stood staring out into the swirling snow.

 

\--------------------------------------------------

 

They set up for the night in the shelter of the pines. The next morning the wind had abated, although it was still snowing heavily when they set out again. 

The snow was already knee-deep, and the horses struggled as they climbed.

They crossed yet another ridge and started down into the next valley. V looked dubiously around at the thick-falling snow settling through the silent air. "If it gets much deeper, we're going to bog down, Greg," she said glumly. "Particularly if we have to keep climbing like this."

"We'll be all right now," the old man assured him. "We follow a series of valleys from here. They lead right up to Diophe, so we can avoid the peaks."

"Greg," Amy said back over her shoulder from her place in the lead, "there are some fresh tracks up here." 

She pointed ahead at a line of footprints plowed through the new snow across their path.

The old man moved ahead and stopped to examine the tracks. "Mutants," he said shortly. "We'd better keep our eyes open."

They rode warily down into the valley where Jasper paused long enough to cut himself a fresh lance.

"I'd be a little dubious about a weapon that keeps breaking," Amy observed as the knight remounted.

Jasper shrugged, his armor creaking. "There are trees everywhere, might as well use ‘em," he replied.

Back among the pines that carpeted the valley floor, Steven heard a familiar barking.

"Grandfather," he warned.

"I hear them," Greg answered.

"How many, do you think?" V asked.

"Perhaps a dozen," Greg said.

"Eight," Aunt Pearl corrected firmly.

"If they are but eight, will they dare attack?" Jasper asked. "Those we met in Flaxia seemed to seek courage in numbers."

"Their lair's in this valley, I think," the old man replied. "Any animal tries to defend its lair. They're almost certain to attack."

"We must seek them out, then," the knight declared confidently.

"Better to destroy them now on ground of our own choosing than to be surprised in some ambush."

"He's definitely backsliding," Amethyst observed sourly to Ruby.

"He's probably right this time, though," Ruby replied.

"Have you been drinking, Ruby?" Amethyst asked incredulously. .

"Come, my Lords," Jasper said airily, his voice suddenly taking on the quality of noble speech. "Let us rout the brutes so that we may continue our journey unmolested." He plowed off through the snow in search of the barking mutant gems.

"Coming, Amy?" Ruby invited as she clenched her fist and her weapon appeared.

Amethyst sighed. "I guess I'd better," she answered mournfully. She turned to Gregarion. "This shouldn't take long. I'll try to keep our bloodthirsty friends out of trouble."

Ruby laughed.

"You're getting to be as bad as he is," Amethyst accused as the two of them moved into a gallop in Jasper's wake.

Steven and the others sat waiting tensely in the sifting snowfall. Then the barking sounds off in the woods suddenly turned into yelps of surprise. The sound of blows began to ring through the trees, and there were shrieks of pain and shouts as the three warriors called to each other. After perhaps a quarter of an hour, they came galloping back with the deep snow spraying out from their horses' hooves.

"Two of them got away," Ruby reported regretfully.

"What a shame," replied V nonchalantly.

"Jasper," Amethyst said with a pained look, "I don’t shy away from a good fight, but this bloodlust of yours is insatiable. I don’t know where you picked it up, but it’s becoming a bad habit."

"Doth it offend you, Lord Amethyst?"

"It's not so much that it offends me, Jasper. It's more a distraction. It breaks my concentration."

"You’re going to miss my laughter."

"Anywhere outside of battle, yes."

"How did it go?" V asked.

"It wasn't much of a fight," Amy replied. "We caught them completely by surprise. I hate to admit it, but our chortling friend there was right for once."

 

Steven thought about Jasper’s changed behavior as they rode on down the valley. Back at the cave where the colt had been born, Bismuth had told Jasper that fear could be conquered by laughing at it, and, though Bismuth had probably not meant it in precisely that way, Jasper had taken his words quite literally. The laughter which so irritated Amethyst was not directed at the foes he met, but rather at the enemy within him. Jasper was laughing at his own fear as he rode to each attack.

 

"It's just.. It’s not  **_natural_ ** ," Amy was muttering to V. "That's what bothers me so much. Not only that, it's a breach of etiquette. If we ever get into a serious fight, it's going to be terribly embarrassing to have him giggling and carrying on like that. What will people think?"

"You're making too much of it, Aimes," V told her in a pacifying tone. "Actually, I think it's rather refreshing."

"You think it's what?"

"Refreshing. An Flaxenite with a sense of humor is a novelty, after all sort of like a talking dog."

Amethyst shook her head in disgust. "There's absolutely no point in ever trying to discuss anything seriously with you, Viddy, do you know that?"

"Hmmmm, and you love me for it.” replied Vidalia with a wistful smile.


	16. Ghosts From The Past

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beset by the weather, it's a long journey yet for our little band. But not without danger, as they've all come to know.
> 
> Faced against their greatest challenge yet, Steven comes face to face with his heritage yet again, but not the way he ever could have expected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *stretches*
> 
> Hi everyone :) 
> 
> I'm so sorry I couldn't find the time to upload. I've just been so busy. Between work and working on how to push in this next character, I've got my work cut out for me for sure. 
> 
> I could find the energy to read, but not to write, on story and comments both. And for that I'm sorry. But I'm back now! And I'll make sure to stick around this time :D

**THE SNOW GRADUALLY** slackened throughout the rest of the day and by evening only a few solitary flakes drifted down through the darkening air as they set up for the night in a grove of dense spruces.

During the night, however, the temperature fell, and the air was bitterly cold when they arose the next morning.

  
"How much farther to Diophe?" V asked, standing close to the fire with shivering hands stretched out to its warmth.   
  
"Two more days at the least," Greg replied.   
  
"I don't suppose you'd consider doing something about the weather?" the little woman asked hopefully.   
  
"I prefer not to do that unless I absolutely have to," the old man told him. "It disrupts things over a very wide area. Besides, the Phenom doesn't like us to tamper with things in his mountains. The Phenai have reservations about that sort of thing."   
  
"I was afraid you might look at it that way."

 

\----------------------------------------------------------

  
Their route that morning twisted and turned so often that by noon Steven was completely turned around.

Despite the biting cold, the sky was overcast, a solid lead-gray. It seemed somehow as if the cold had frozen all color from the world. The sky was gray; the snow was a flat, dead white; and the tree trunks were starkly black. Even the rushing water in the streams they followed flowed black between snow-mounded banks.

Greg moved confidently, pointing their direction as each succeeding valley intersected with another.   
  
"Are you sure?" the shivering V asked him at one point. "We've been going upstream all day, now you say we go down."   
  
"We'll hit another valley in a few miles. Trust me, V. I've been here before."   
V pulled her heavy cloak tighter. "It's just that I get nervous on unfamiliar ground,"she objected, looking at the dark water of the river they followed.   
  
From far upstream came a strange sound, a kind of mindless hooting that was almost like laughter. Aunt Pearl and Greg exchanged a quick look.   
  
"What is it?" Steven asked.   
  
"Rock-wolf," Greg answered shortly.   
  
"Wolf? It doesn't sound like a wolf."   
  
"It isn't." The old man looked around warily. "They're scavengers for the most part and, if it's just a wild pack, they probably won't attack. It's too early in the winter for them to be that desperate. If it's one of the packs that has been raised by the Corrupted, though, we're in for trouble." He stood up in his stirrups to look ahead. "Let's pick up the pace a bit," he called to Jasper, "and keep your eyes open."   
Jasper, his armor glittering with frost, glanced back, nodded, and moved out at a trot, following the seething black water of the mountain river.   
  
Behind them the shrill, yelping laughter grew louder.   
  
"They're following us, Greg,"Aunt Pearl said, her voice low.   
  
"I can hear that." The old man began searching the sides of the valley with his eyes, his face creased with a worried frown. "You'd better have a look, Pearl. I don't want any surprises."   
Aunt Pearl's eyes grew distant as she probed the thickly forested sides of the valley with her mind. After a moment, she gasped and then shuddered. “There's a corrupted gem out there, Greg. Her mind is a sewer."   
  
"They always are," the old man replied. "Could you pick up her name?"   
  
“Biggs."   
  
"That's what I was afraid of. I knew we were getting close to her range." He put his fingers to his lips and whistled sharply.   
Amethyst and Jasper halted to wait while the rest caught up with them. "We've got trouble,"Greg told them all seriously. A corrupted gem’s out there with a pack of rock-wolves.She's watching us right now. It's only a question of time until she attacks."   
  
A corrupted gem?" V asked.   
  
“They're the same as gem mutants, but far, far worse. Gem mutants were twisted into those things  **_after_ ** they died. These ones though…” Greg trailed off.    
  
"But only one?"Jasper asked.   
  
"One's enough. I've met this one. Her name’s Biggs. She's big, quick, and as cruel as a hook-pointed knife. She'll eat anything that moves, and she doesn't really care if it's dead or not before she starts to eat."   
  
The hooting laughter of the rock-wolves drew closer.   
  
"Let's find an open place and build a fire," the old man said. "The rock-wolves are afraid of fire, and there's no point in fighting with them  **_and_ ** Biggs if we don't have to."   
  
"There?" Bismuth suggested, pointing to a broad, snow-covered bar protruding out into the dark water of the river. The bar was joined to the near bank by a narrow neck of gravel and sand.   
  
"This looks good, Greg," Amethyst approved, squinting at the bar. "The river will keep them off our backs, and they can only come at us across that one narrow place."   
  
"It’ll do," Greg agreed shortly. "Let's go."   
  
They rode out onto the snow-covered bar and quickly scraped an area clear with their feet while Bismuth worked to build a fire under a large, gray driftwood snag that half blocked the narrow neck of the bar. Within a few moments, orange flames began to lick up around the snag. Bismuth fed the fire with sticks until the snag was fully ablaze. 

 

"Give me a hand," the smith said, starting to pile larger pieces of wood on the fire. Amethyst and Jasper went to the jumbled mass of driftwood piled against the upstream edge of the gravel and began hauling limbs and chunks of log to the fire. 

At the end of a quarter of an hour they had built a roaring bonfire that stretched across the narrow neck of sand, cutting them off completely from the dark trees on the riverbank.   
  
"It's the first time I've been warm all day." V grinned, backing up to the fire.   
  
"They're coming," Steven warned. Back among the dark tree trunks, he had caught a few glimpses of furtive movements.   
  


Amethyst peered through the flames. "Yikes. Those things are big, aren’t they?" she observed grimly.   
  
"About the size of a donkey," Greg confirmed.   
  
"Are you sure they're afraid of fire?" V asked nervously.   
  
"Most of the time."   
  
" **_Most_ ** of the time?"   
  
"Once in a while they get desperate - or Biggs could drive them toward us. They'd be more afraid of her than of the fire."   
  
“Greg," the little woman objected, "sometimes you've got a nasty habit of keeping things to yourself."   
  
One of the rock-wolves came out onto the riverbank just upstream from the bar and stood sniffing the air and looking nervously at the fire. Its forelegs were noticeably longer than its hind ones, giving it a peculiar, half erect stance, and there was a large, muscular hump across its shoulders. Its muzzle was short, and it seemed snub-faced, almost like a cat. Its coat was a splotchy black and white, marked with a pattern hovering somewhere between spots and stripes. It paced nervously back and forth, staring at them with a dreadful intensity and yelping its highpitched, hooting laugh. Soon another came out to join it, and then another. They spread out along the bank, pacing and hooting, but staying well back from the fire.   
  
"They don't look like dogs exactly," Bismuth said.   
  
"They're not," Greg replied. "Wolves and dogs are related, but rock-wolves belong to a different family."   
  
By now ten of the ugly creatures lined the bank, and their hooting rose in a mindless chorus.   
  
Then Connie screamed, her face deathly pale and her eyes wide with horror.   
  
The corrupted gem shambled out of the trees and stood in the middle of the yelping pack. It was about eight feet tall and covered with shaggy white fur. Its tough orange hide was segmented with thick, irregular plates that interlaced like armour. wore an armored shirt that had been made of large scraps of chainmail tied together with thongs. A conical steel helmet, split up the back to make it fit, covered the brute's head. In its hand the brute held a huge, steelwrapped club, studded with spikes. It was the face, however, that had brought the scream to Connie's lips. The monster had virtually no nose, and its lower jaw jutted, showing two massive, protruding sharp tusks. Its eyes were sunk in deep sockets beneath a heavy ridge of bone across its brow, and they burned with a hideous hunger.   
  
"That's far enough, Biggs," Greg warned the thing in a cold, deadly voice.   
  
"'Gareg come back to Biggs's mountains?" the monster growled lowly. Its voice was deep and hollow, chilling.   
  
"It talks?" V gasped incredulously.   
  
"Why are you following us, Biggs?" Greg demanded.   
  
The creature stared at them, its eyes like fire. "Hungry, 'Gar," it growled.   
  
"Go hunt something else," the old man told the monster.   
  
"Why? Horses here - men. Plenty to eat."   
  
"But not easy food, Biggs," Greg replied.   
  
A hideous grin spread across Biggs's face. "Fight first," she said, "then eat. Come 'Gar. Fight again."   
  
"Gar?" V asked.   
  
"She means me. She can't pronounce my name - it has to do with the shape of her jaw."   
  
"You **_fought_ ** that thing?" Amethyst sounded stunned.

  
Greg shrugged. "I had a knife up my sleeve. When she grabbed me, I sliced her open. It wasn't much of a fight."   
  
" **_FIGHT!_ ** " Biggs roared. She hammered on her shaggy white chest. "Iron," she said. "Come, 'Gareg. Try to cut Biggs's belly again. Now Biggs make chest like iron -- like men wear." She began to pound on the frozen ground with her steel-shod club. " **_Fight!_ ** " she bellowed. "Come, Gareg! Fight!"   
  
"Maybe if we all go after her at once, one of us might get in a lucky thrust," Vidalia said, eyeing the monster speculatively.   
  
"I don’t think that’s going to work, Lady Vidalia," Jasper told her. "We’re going to lose several companions should we come within range of that club."

  
Amethyst looked at him in astonishment. "Caution, Jasper? Caution from you?"   
  
"It were best, I think, should I undertake this alone," the knight stated gravely. "My lance is the only weapon that can seek out the monster's life with safety."   
  
"You know, I think I’m with Jasper on this one." Ruby agreed.   
  
"Come fight!" Biggs roared, still beating on the ground with his club.   
  
"All right,"Amethyst agreed dubiously. "We'll distract him then - come at him from two sides to get his attention. Then Jasper can make his charge."   
  
"What about the rock-wolves?"Steven asked.   
  
"Let me try something," Bismuth said. He took up a burning stick and threw it, spinning and flaring, at the nervous pack surrounding the monster. The rock-wolves yelped and shied quickly away from the tumbling brand. "They're afraid of the fire, all right," the smith said. "I think that if we all throw at once and keep throwing, their nerve will break and they'll run."   
  
They all moved to the fire.   
  
"Now!" Bismuth shouted sharply. They began throwing the blazing sticks as fast as they could. The rock-wolves yelped and dodged, and several of them screamed in pain as the tumbling firebrands singed them.   
  
Biggs roared in fury as the pack dodged and scurried around his feet, trying to escape the sudden deluge of fire. One of the singed beasts, maddened by pain and fright, tried to leap at her. Biggs jumped out of its way with astonishing agility and smashed the rock-wolf to the ground with her great club.   
  
"Shite, she’s quicker than I thought,"Amethyst said. "We'll have to be careful."   
  
"They're running!" Bismuth shouted, throwing another fiery stick. The pack had broken under the rain of burning brands and turned to flee howling back into the woods, leaving the infuriated Biggs standing alone on the riverbank, hammering at the snow-covered ground with his spiked club. "Come fight!" she roared again. "Come fight!" She advanced one huge step and smashed her club at the snow again.   
  
"We'd better do whatever we're going to do now," V said tensely. "She’s getting herself worked up. We'll have her out here on the bar with us in another minute or two."   
Jasper nodded grimly and turned to mount his charger.   
  
"Let the rest of us distract him first,"Amethyst said. He drew his heavy sword. "Let's go!" he shouted and leaped over the fire. The others followed him, spreading out in a half circle in front of the towering Biggs.Steven reached for his sword.   
  
" **_Not you,_ ** "Aunt Pearl snapped. "You stay here."   
  
"But--”    
  
"Do as I say."   
  
One of V's daggers, skillfully thrown from several yards away, sank into Biggs's shoulder while the creature was advancing on Amethyst and Bismuth. Biggs howled and turned to charge V andRuby, swinging her vast club. Ruby dodged, and V danced back out of reach. Bismuth began pelting the monster with fist-sized rocks from the riverbank. Biggs turned back, raging now, with flecks of foam dripping from her pointed tusks.   
  
"Now,Jasper!"Amethyst shouted.   
Jasper couched his lance and spurred his warhorse. The huge armored animal leaped forward, its hooves churning gravel, jumped the fire, and bore down on the astonished Biggs. For a moment it looked as if their plan might work. The deadly, steel-pointed lance was leveled at Biggs's chest, and it seemed that nothing could stop it from plunging through his huge body. But the monster's quickness again astonished them all. She leaped to one side and smashed his spiked club down on Jasper's lance, shattering the stout wood.   
  
The force of Jasper's charge, however, could not be stopped. Horse and man crashed into the great brute with a deafening impact. Biggs reeled back, dropping his club, tripping, falling with Jasper and his warhorse on top of her.   
  
"Get her!" Amethyst roared, and they all dashed forward to attack the fallen Biggs with swords and axes. The monster, however, levered his legs under Jasper's thrashing horse and thrust the big animal off. A great, flailing fist caught Jasper in the side, throwing him for several yards. Bismuth spun and dropped, felled by a glancing blow to the head even as Amethyst,Ruby, and V swarmed over the fallen Biggs.   
  
"Father!"Aunt Pearl cried in a ringing voice.   
  
There was suddenly a new sound directly behind Steven - first a deep, rumbling snarl followed instantly by a hair-raising howl.Steven turned quickly and saw the huge wolf he had seen once before in the forests of northern Flaxia. The old silvery wolf bounded across the fire and entered the fight, his great teeth flashing and tearing.   
  
Steven, I need you!"Aunt Pearl was shaking off the panic-stricken princess and pulling her amulet out of her bodice. "Take out your medallion-- quickly!"   
  
He did not understand, but he drew his amulet out from under his tunic. Aunt Pearl reached out, took his right hand, and placed the mark on his palm against the figure of the owl on her own talisman; at the same time, she took his medallion in her other hand. 

 

"Focus," she commanded.   
  
"On what?"   
  
"On the amulets. Quickly!"

  
Steven brought his will to bear, feeling the power building in him tremendously, amplified somehow by his contact with Aunt Pearl and the two amulets. Polina closed her eyes and raised her face to the leaden sky. 

 

" **_Mother!"_ ** she cried in a voice so loud that the echo rang like a trumpet note in the narrow valley.   
  
The power surged out of Steven in so vast a rush that he collapsed to his knees, unable to stand. Aunt Pearl sank down beside him, equally spent.    
Connie gasped.   
  
As Steven weakly raised his head, he saw that there were  **_two_ ** wolves attacking the raging Biggs - the gray old wolf he knew to be his grandfather, and another, slightly smaller wolf that seemed surrounded by a strange, flickering pink light.   
  
Biggs had struggled to her feet and was laying about her with his huge fists as the men attacking her chopped futilely at her armored body. Amethyst was flung out of the fight and fell to her hands and knees, shaking her head groggily. 

Biggs brushed Ruby aside, her eyes alight with dreadful glee as she lunged toward Amethyst with both huge arms raised. But the pink wolf was there in an instant, leaping and snarling at her face. Biggs swung her fist out wide and gaped with astonishment as it passed directly through the flickering body. Then she shrieked with pain and began to topple backward as Greg, darting in from behind to employ the wolf's ancient tactic, neatly hamstrung her with great, ripping teeth. The towering Biggs, howling, fell and struck the earth like some vast tree.   
  
"Keep him down!" Amethyst roared, stumbling to her feet and staggering forward.   
  
The wolves were ripping at Biggs's face, and she flailed her arms, trying to beat them away. Again and again her hands passed through the body of the strange, flickering pink wolf. Jasper, his feet spread wide apart and holding the hilt of his broadsword with both hands, chopped steadily at the monster's body, his great blade shearing long rents in Biggs's breastplate.

Amethyst swung huge blows at Biggs's head, her studded whip striking sparks from the rusty steel helmet. Ruby crouched at one side, eyes intent, knives in hand, waiting. Biggs raised his arm to ward off Amethyst's blows, and Ruby lunged, thrusting repeatedly into her exposed chest with knife after knife. A bloody froth spouted from Biggs's mouth as one knife ripped through her lungs. Her form rippled and crackled as it struggled to remain corporeal.   
  
Then V, who had lurked just at the edge of the fight, darted in, set the point of her dagger against the back of Biggs's neck and smashed a large rock against the dagger's pommel. With a sickening crunch, the dagger drove through bone, angling upward, before finding its mark against something brittle and hard. Biggs's eyes went wide as she shuddered convulsively. Then she poofed, shards of her gem scattering into the snow as her enormous form dissipated into nothingness.   
  


\-----------------------------------------------------------

  
In the moment of silence that followed, the two wolves looked at each other across the monster's dead face. 

The pink wolf seemed to wink once; in a voice which Steven  could hear quite clearly - a woman's voice - she said, "How remarkable." With a seeming smile and one last flicker, she vanished.

  
The old gray wolf raised his muzzle and howled, a sound of such piercing anguish and loss that Steven's heart wrenched within him.   
  
Then the old wolf seemed to shimmer, and Greg knelt in his place. He rose slowly to his feet and walked back toward the fire, tears streaming openly down his grizzled cheeks.


	17. As Above, So Below.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Fellowship find some much needed refuge, and are about to meet their next member.

" **IS HE GOING** to be all right?" Amethyst asked anxiously, hovering over the still unconscious Bismuth as Aunt Pearl examined the large purple contusion on the side of the smith's face.

 

"He’s…." she paused as the words seemed to catch in her mouth. “He’s fine. He’s going to be fine.”

Though the wilting tone left them unsure.

 

Steven sat nearby with his head in his hands. He felt as if all the strength had been wrenched out of his body.

Beyond the heaped coals of the rapidly dying bonfire, Vidalia and Ruby were struggling to remove Jasper’s dented breastplate. A deep crease running diagonally from shoulder to hip gave mute evidence of the force of Biggs’s blow and placed so much stress on the straps beneath the shoulder plates that they were almost impossible to unfasten.

"I think we're going to have to cut them," V said.

"Princess Vidalia, please, I beg of you to leave that as the **_last_ **resort," Jasper answered, wincing as they wrenched at the fastenings. "Those straps are crucial to the fit of the armor, and are so very difficult to replace."

"This one's coming now," Ruby grunted, prying at a buckle with a short iron rod. The buckle released suddenly and the taut breastplate rang like a softly struck bell.

"Now I can get it," Vidalia breathed, quickly loosening the other shoulder buckle.

Jasper sighed with relief as they pulled off the dented breastplate. He took a deep breath and winced again.

 

"Tender right here?" V asked, splaying her fingers lightly to the right side of the knight's chest. Jasper grunted with pain, and his face paled visibly.

"I think you've got some cracked ribs, my splendid friend," V told him. "You'd better have Lady Pearl take a look."

"In a moment," Jasper said. "My horse?"

"He'll be all right," Ruby replied with a small smile. "A strained tendon in his right foreleg is all."

Jasper let out a sigh of relief. "I had feared for him."

At his concern, Ruby’s smile widened a little more. But she said nothing.

"I feared for us all there for a while," V said. "Our oversized playmate there was almost more than we could handle."

"Good fight, though," Ruby remarked.

V gave her a disgusted look, then glanced up at the scudding gray clouds overhead. She jumped across the glowing coals of their fire and went over to where Gregarion sat staring into the icy river.

"We're going to have to get off this bar, Greg," she urged. "The weather's going bad on us again, and we'll all freeze to death if we stay out here in the middle of the river tonight."

"Leave me alone," Greg muttered shortly, still staring at the river.

"Polina?" V turned to her.

"Just stay away from him for a while," she told him. "Go find a sheltered place for us to stay for a few days."

"I'll go with you," Amethyst offered, hobbling toward her horse.

"Amethyst, you’ll do no such thing,," Aunt Pearl declared firmly. "You creak like a wagon with a broken axle. I want to have a look at you before you take the chance to damage yourself permanently."

"I know a place," Connie said, rising and pulling her cloak about her shoulders. "I saw it when we were coming down the river. I'll show you."

Vidalia looked inquiringly at Aunt Pearl.

"Go ahead," she told him. "It's safe enough now. Nothing else would live in the same valley with a corrupted gem."

V laughed at that. "I wonder why?”

She saddled atop her horse as Connie made to do the same. “Coming, Princess?” she called as she set off at a patient trot, seemingly unaware of the other princess struggling to get on.

 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

"Shouldn't Bismuth be coming around?" Steven asked his Aunt.

"Let him sleep," she replied wearily. "He'll have a blinding headache when he wakes up."

"Aunt Pearl?"

"Yes?"

"Who was the other wolf?"

Another pause.

“She… was my mother… Rosalina.”

"But isn't she--"

"Yes. It was her spirit."

"You can do that?" Steven was stunned by the enormity of it.

"Not alone," she said. "You had to help me."

"Is that why I feel so--" It was an effort even to talk.

"It took everything we could both raise to do it. Don't ask so many questions just now, Steven. I'm very tired and I still have many things to do."

"Is Grandfather all right?"

"He'll come around. Jasper, come here."

The knight stepped over the coals at the neck of the bar and walked slowly toward her, his hand pressed lightly against his chest.

"You'll have to take off your shirt," she told him. "And please sit down."

 

\------------------------------------

 

About a half hour later V and the princess returned.

"It's a good spot," V reported. "A thicket in a little ravine. Water, shelter - everything we need. Is anybody seriously hurt?"

"Nothing permanent." Aunt Pearl was applying a salve to Amethyst’s hairy leg.

"Do you suppose you could hurry, P?" Amy asked. "It's a little chilly for standing around half-dressed."

"If you want it to be fast, maybe next time you could form less hair on your leg," she said heartlessly.

 

The ravine to which Vidalia and Connie led them was a short way back upriver. A small mountain brook trickled from its mouth, and a dense thicket of spindly pines filled it seemingly from wall to wall. They followed the brook for a few hundred yards until they came to a small clearing in the center of the thicket. The pines around the inner edge of the clearing, pressed by the limbs of the others in the thicket, leaned inward, almost touching above the center of the open area.

"Good spot." Ruby looked around approvingly. "How did you find it?"

"She did." V nodded at Connie.

"The trees told me it was here," she said. "Young pine trees babble a lot." She looked at the clearing thoughtfully. "We'll build our fire there," she decided, pointing at a spot near the brook at the upper end of the clearing, "and set up our tents along the, edge of the trees just back from it. You'll need to pile rocks around the fire and clear away all the twigs from the ground near it. The trees are very nervous about the fire. They promised to keep the wind off us, but only if we keep our fire strictly under control. I gave them my word."

A faint smile flickered across Ruby's red, cherub-like face.

"I'm serious," she said, stamping her little foot.

"Of course, your Highness," she replied, bowing.

 

Because of the incapacity of the others, the work of setting up the tents and building the firepit fell largely upon Vidalia and Ruby. Connie commanded them like a little general, snapping out her orders in a clear, firm voice. She seemed to be enjoying herself immensely.

Steven was sure that it was some trick of the fading light, but the trees almost seemed to draw back when the fire first flared up, though after a while they seemed to lean back in again to arch protectively over the little clearing. Wearily he got to his feet and began to gather sticks and dead limbs for firewood.

"Now," Connie said, bustling about the fire in a thoroughly businesslike way, "what would you all like for supper?"

They stayed in their protected little clearing for three days while their battered warriors and Jasper’s horse recuperated from the encounter with the corrupted gem. The exhaustion which had fallen upon Steven when Aunt Pearl had summoned all his strength to help call the spirit of Rosalina was largely gone after one night's sleep, though he tired easily during the next day. He found Connie’s officiousness in her domain near the fire almost unbearable, so he passed some time helping Bismuth hammer the deep crease out of Jasper’s breastplate; after that, he spent as much time as possible with the horses. He began teaching the little colt a few simple tricks, though he had never attempted training animals before. The colt seemed to enjoy it, although his attention wandered frequently.

The incapacity of Bismuth, Amethyst, and Jasper was easy to understand, but Greg’s deep silence and seeming indifference to all around him worried Steven. The old man appeared to be sunk in a melancholy reverie that he could not or would not shake off.

"Aunt Pearl," Garion said finally on the afternoon of the third day, "you'd better do something. We'll be ready to leave soon, and Grandfather has to be able to show us the way. Right now I don't think he even cares where he is."

Aunt Pearl looked across at the old sorcerer, who sat on a rock, staring into the fire. She sighed. "It **_has_ ** been a while…” she murmured. “Come with me.”

She led the way around the fire and stopped directly in front of the old man. "All right, Greg," she said crisply, "I think that's about enough."

"I’m not in the mood, Pearl. Go away." he told her.

"No, father," she replied. "It's time for you to put it away and come back to the real world."

"That was a cruel thing to do, Pearl," he said reproachfully.

"To mother? She didn't mind."

"How do you know that? You never knew her. She died when you were born."

"What's **_that_ **got to do with it?" She looked at him directly. "Father," she declared pointedly, "you of all people should know that mother was extremely strong-minded. She's always been with me, and we know each other very well."

He looked dubious.

"She has her part to play in this just the same as the rest of us do. If you'd been paying attention all these years, you'd have realized that she's never really been gone."

The old man looked around a little guiltily.

"Precisely," Aunt Pearl said with just the hint of a barb in her voice. "You really should have behaved yourself, you know. Mother's very tolerant for the most part, but there were times when she was quite vexed with you."

Gregarion coughed uncomfortably.

"Now it's time for you to pull yourself out of this and stop feeling sorry for yourself," she continued crisply.

His eyes narrowed. "That's not entirely fair, Pearl," he replied.

"I don't have time to be fair, father."

"Why did you choose **_that_ **particular form?" he asked with a hint of bitterness.

"I didn't, father. She did. It's her natural form, after all."

"I'd almost forgotten that," he mused.

"She didn't."

The old man straightened and drew back his shoulders. "Is there any food around?" he asked suddenly.

"The princess has been doing the cooking," Steven warned him. "You might want to think it over before you decide to eat anything she's had a hand in."

 

\------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

The next morning under a still-threatening sky, they struck their tents, packed their gear again, and rode down along the narrow bed of the brook back into the river valley.

"Did you thank the trees, dear?" Aunt Pearl asked the princess.

"Yes, Lady Polina," Connie replied. "Just before we left."

"Good," Aunt Pearl said.

 

The weather continued to threaten for the next two days, and finally the blizzard broke in full fury as they approached a strangely pyramidal peak. The sloping walls of the peak were steep, rising sharply up into the swirling snow, and they seemed to have none of the random irregularities of the surrounding mountains. Though he rejected the idea immediately, Steven could not quite overcome the notion that the curiously angular peak had somehow been constructed - that its shape was the result of a conscious design.

"Diophe," Greg said, pointing at the peak with one hand while he clung to his wind-whipped cloak with the other.

"How do we get up there?" V asked, staring at the steep walls dimly visible in the driving snow.

"There's a road," the old man replied. "It starts over there." He pointed to a vast pile of jumbled rock to one side of the peak.

"We'd better hurry then, Greg," Amy said. "This storm isn't getting any lighter."

The old man nodded and moved his horse into the lead. "When we get up there," he shouted back to them over the sound of the shrieking wind, "we'll find the city. It's abandoned, but you may see a few things lying about-broken pots, some other things. Don't touch any of them. The Phenai have some peculiar beliefs about Diophe. It's a very holy place to them, and everything there is supposed to stay just where it is."

"How do we get down into the caves?" Amethyst asked.

"The Phenai will let us in," Greg assured him. "They already know we're here."

 

The road that led to the mountaintop was a narrow ledge, inclining steeply up and around the sides of the peak. They dismounted before they started up and led their horses. The wind tugged at them as they climbed, and the driving snow, more pellets than flakes, stung their faces.

It took them two hours to wind their way to the top, and Steven was numb with cold by the time they got there. The wind seemed to batter at him, trying to pluck him off the ledge, and he made a special point of staying as far away from the edge as possible.

Though the wind had been brutal on the sides of the peak, once they reached the top it howled at them with unbroken force. They passed through a broad, arched gate into the deserted city of Diophe with snow swirling about them and the wind shrieking insanely in their ears.

There were columns lining the empty streets, tall, thick columns reaching up into the dancing snow. The buildings, all unroofed by time and the endless progression of the seasons, had a strange, alien quality about them. Accustomed to the rigid rectangularity of the structures in the other cities he had seen, Steven was unprepared for the sloped corners of Phenaidian architecture. Nothing seemed exactly square. The complexity of the angles teased at his mind, suggesting a subtle sophistication that somehow just eluded him. There was an immensity about the construction that seemed to defy time, and the weathered stones sat solidly, one atop the other, precisely as they had been placed thousands of years before.

 

Bismuth seemed also to have noticed the peculiar nature of the structures, and his expression was one of disapproval. As they all moved behind a building to get out of the wind and to rest for a moment from the exertions of the climb, he ran his hand up one of the slanted corners. "Hadn't they ever heard of a plumb line?" he muttered critically.

"Where do we go to find the Phenai?" Amethyst asked, pulling her pumaskin cloak even tighter about her.

"It isn't far," Greg answered.

They led their horses back out into the blizzard-swept streets, past the strange, pyramidal buildings.

"An eerie place," Jasper said, looking around him. "How long has it been abandoned like this?"

"Since Black Diamond cracked the world," Greg replied. "About five thousand years."

They trudged across a broad street through the deepening snow to a building somewhat larger than the ones about it and passed inside through a wide doorway surmounted by a huge stone lintel. Inside, the air hung still and calm. A few flakes of snow drifted down through the silent air, sifting through the narrow opening at the top where the roof had been and lightly dusting the stone floor.

Gregarion moved purposefully to a large black stone in the precise center of the floor. The stone was cut in such a way as to duplicate the truncated pyramidal shape of the buildings in the city, angling up to a flat surface about four feet above the floor. "Don't touch it," he warned them, carefully stepping around the stone.

"Is it dangerous?" Amethyst asked.

"No," Greg said. "It's holy. The Phenai don't want it profaned. They believe that DIO himself placed it here." He studied the floor intently, scraping away the thin dusting of snow with his foot in several places. "Let's see." He frowned slightly. Then he uncovered a single flagstone that seemed a slightly different color from those surrounding it. "Here we are," he grunted. "I always have to look for it. Give me your sword, Jasper."

Wordlessly the big man drew his sword and handed it to the old sorcerer.

Gregarion knelt beside the flagstone he'd uncovered and rapped sharply on it three times with the pommel of Jasper's heavy sword. The sound seemed to echo hollowly from underneath.

The old man waited for a moment, then repeated his signal. Nothing happened.

A third time Greg hammered his three measured strokes on the echoing flagstone. A slow grinding sound started in one corner of the large chamber.

"What's that?" V demanded nervously.

"The Phenaidians," Gregarion replied, rising to his feet and dusting off his knees. "They're opening the portal to the caves."

The grinding continued and a line of faint light appeared suddenly about twenty feet out from the east wall of the chamber. The line became a crack and then slowly yawned wider as a huge stone in the floor tilted up, rising with a ponderous slowness. The light from below seemed very dim.

"Gregarion," a deep voice echoed from beneath the slowly tilting stone, "Sella ma, pagi DIO. "

"Sella ma, pagi DIO. ka pada mu, " Gregarion responded formally. "Baek lar, Gregarion. Ma sek Phenai, " the unseen speaker said.

"What was that?" Steven asked in perplexity.

"He invited us into the caves," the old man said. "Shall we go down now?"


	18. Into The Caverns Below

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Safe at last from the terrors of the Phenaidian wilderness, the fellowship delve deep into Diophe in pursuit of their quest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's a short chapter I'm afraid xc
> 
> But I did finally throw out someone new to add to our little pack <3

**IT TOOK ALL** Of Ruby’s force of persuasion to start the horses moving down the steeply inclined passageway that led into the dimness of the caves of Phenai.

Their eyes rolled nervously as they took step after braced step down the slanting corridor, and they all flinched noticeably as the grinding stone boomed shut behind them. The colt walked so close to Steven that they frequently bumped against each other, and Steven could feel the little animal's trembling with every step.

At the end of the corridor, two figures stood, each with his face veiled in a kind of filmy cloth. They were short men, shorter even than Vidalia, but their shoulders seemed bulky beneath their dark robes. Just beyond them an irregularly shaped chamber opened out, faintly lighted by a dim, reddish glow.

Gregarion moved toward the two, and they bowed respectfully, deferentially even, to him as he approached. He spoke briefly, and they bowed again, pointing towards another corridor opening on the far side of the chamber. Steven looked nervously around for the source of the faint red light, but it seemed lost in the strange, pointed rocks hanging from the ceiing.

“We’ll go this way,” Greg quietly told them, crossing the chamber toward the corridor the two veiled men had indicated earlier.

“Why are their faces covered?” Bismuth whispered.

“To protect their eyes from the light when they opened the portal.”

“But it was almost pitch black inside that building up there.”

“Not to a Phenai,” the old man replied.

“Don’t _any_ of them speak our language?”

“Ehhhh, a few. Not many. They aren’t the kind to mingle with outsiders. We better hurry. The Phenom is waiting for us.”

The corridor they entered ran for a short distance and then abruptly opened into an undercavern so vast that Steven could not even see the other side of it even in the faint light that seemed to pervade the caves.

“Just how far do these caverns go, Gregarion?” Jasper asked, somewhat awed by the sheer immensity of the structure.

“No one knows for sure. The Phenaidians have been exploring the caves since they came down here. Some of them still haven’t made their way back.”

The passageway they had followed from the portal chamber had opened high up in the wall of the cavern near its vaulted roof, and a broad ledge sloped downward from the opening, running along the sheer wall. Holes of various shapes and sizes pockmarked the entire structure, all the way down toward the floor it seemed. Steven glanced once over the edge. The cavern floor was lost in the misty gloom far below. Shuddering, he stayed closed to the wall after that.

 

As they descended, they found that the huge cavern was not silent. From what seemed to be like infinitely far away, there was the cadence of chanting by an amalgamation of tonalities, some deep and baritone, others high and melodious. Their words were blurred and confused by the echoes reverberating from the stone walls and seemed to die off, endlessly repeated. Then, as the last echoes of the chant faded, the chorus began, its song strangely disharmonic and in a mournful, minor key. In peculiar fashion, the disharmony of the first phrases came echoing back to join the succeeding phrases and merged with them, moving inexorably toward a final, harmonic resolution so profound that Greg found his entire being moved by it. The echoes merged as the chorus ended its song, and the caves of Phenai sang on alone, repeating that final chord over and over.

“I… I’ve never heard anything like that.” Connie whispered softly.

“Very few people have,” Pearl replied. “though the harmonic resonance of the chant will linger in these caves for days.”

“What were they singing?”

“It’s a hymn to DIO. It’s repeated every hour, and the echoes keep it alive. These caves have been singing that same song for about, five thousand years now.”

There were other sounds as well, the scrape of metal against metal, snatches of conversation uttered in the strange, alien language of the Phenai, and an endless chipping sound, coming, it seemed, from a dozen places.

“There’s gotta be a lotta them down there.” Amethyst mused, peering over the edge.

“Not necessarily,” Greg told her. “Sound lingers in these caves, so what you’re hearing might just be echoes. Though they _sound_ like there’s a lot.”

“Where’s this light coming from?” Bismuth asked, looking puzzled. “I don’t see any torches.”

“The Phenai grind two different kinds of rock to powder,” Greg replied. “When you mix them, they give off a glow.”

“It’s pretty dim lighting,” Bismuth observed.

“Phenaidians don’t need that much light.”

 

It took them almost half an hour, just walking, to reach the cavern floor. The walls around the bottom were pierced at regular intervals with the opening of corridors and galleries radiating out into the solid rock of the mountain. As they passed, Steven glanced down one of the galleries. It was long and very dimly lighted with openings along its walls and a few Phenai moving from place to place far down toward the other end.

In the centre of the cavern lay a large, silent lake, and they skirted the lake’s edge as Greg moved confidently, seeming to know precisely where he was going. Somewhere from far out on the dim lake, Steven heard a faint splash, a fish perhaps ( _this far underground?)_ or maybe the sound of a dislodged pebble falling into the water from far above. The echo of the singing they had heard in the cavern still lingered, curiously loud in some places, and very faint in others.

Two Phenai waited for them near the entrance to one of the galleries. They bowed and spoke briefly to Gregarion. Like the men who had met them in the portal chamber, both were short and had peculiarly pointed heads. Their hair was a very pale blonde, and their eyes large and questioning.

“We’ll leave the horses here,” Greg said. “We have to go down some stairs. These kind gems will care for them.”

 _Wait._ Steven thought. _Did he say gems?_ He turned to regard the the hooded figures they had passed, now struggling with the obviously unfamiliar process of reining in frightened horses.

The colt, still trembling, had to be told several times to stay with his mother, but he finally seemed to catch on. Then Steven, realising he had lagged behind, hurried to catch up with the others, who had already entered the mouth of one of the galleries.

There were doors in the walls of the gallery they followed, opening into small cubicles, some of them obviously workshops of some kind, and others just as obviously arranged for domestic use. Curiously, Steven thought he had caught sight of what appeared to be living rocks, scuttling about from here to there on four legs, assisting the Phenai with various activities. Two such creatures stood by one pair of Phenai stonemasons, periodically spraying some liquid goop over the one working with metal, and another who was carving stone. In another room, a Phenai was nursing a gemling, and one of those little four-legged, round rock creatures was waiting on her, and though it had no eyes, seemed to almost be keeping watch over the little gem.

Having never seen this many gems so closely before, Steven looked on in abject fascination at the little glimpses of quotidian routine that permeated Phenaidian culture.

Behind them in cavern they had just exited, the sound of the chanting began again. They passed a cubicle where seven Phenai, seated in a circle, were reciting something in unison.

“They spend a great deal of time in religious observances,” Greg remarked as they passed the cubicle. “Religion’s the central facet of Phenaidian life.”

“Sounds dreadfully boring,” yawned Amethyst.

At the end of the gallery, a flight of steep, worn stairs descended sharply, such that they had to run their hands along the equally slippery wall to steady themselves.

“It’s so easy to get turned around down here.” Vidalia murmured. “I don’t think we’ve gone down ten steps and I’ve already forgotten if we’re going left or right.”

“Down." Ruby told her.

“Thanks, Red.” Viddy replied dryly.

At the bottom of the stairs, they entered yet another cavern. The very sight of it earned a flustered groan from some members of their little party, which promptly reverberated off the cloistered cave walls.

“Quiet!” Greg hissed. “This is the home cave of one of the major Phenai tribes. Keep your voices _down._ ”

The first disharmonic phrases of their hymn to DIO drifted up to them as they neared the opposite end of a narrow stone bridge that connected their exit to the central stalactite spire. “I wish they’d sing something else.” Amethyst muttered sourly. “This one’s _really_ starting to get old.”

“I’ll mention that to the first Phenai I meet.” Vidalia teased her lightly. “I’m sure they’d only be glad to switch songs for you.”

“I’ll deny every word, Viddy.” Amy hissed back.

“It probably hasn’t occurred to them that their song isn’t universally admired.”

“Can we drop it?”

“I mean, after all, they’ve only been singing it for _five thousand years_.”

“Vidalia, that’s quite enough.” Aunt Pearl told the diminiutive lady.

“Anything you say, great lady.” V answered flippantly.

 

They entered another gallery on the far side of the cavern and followed it until it branched. Greg led them firmly to the left.

“Are you sure about this, Greg?” V asked. “I could be wrong, but it feels like we’re going in a circle.”

“That’s because we are.”

“Oh. Okay. Care to explain what you mean by that?”

“There’s a cavern I wanted to avoid. So I brought us around it.”

“Ooookay. Why avoid it? Cave monsters?” V asked honestly. Steven thought he heard just the slightest hint of trepidation in her voice.

“Nope. It’s just unstable. The slightest vibration could bring the whole roof crashing down.”

“Oh.”

“That’s one of the dangers down here.”

“Don’t have to tell me twice, old friend.” Vidalia said, her voice taking on a whole new kind of anxious tone. She got a little more chattier than usual, and Steven’s own sense of oppression at the thought of all the rock surrounding him gave him a quick insight into Vidalia’s mind. The sense of being closed in was unbearable to some people, and Vidalia it appeared, was one of them. Steven glanced up though, and seemed to almost feel the weight of the mountain pressing down firmly on him. He suddenly decided then, that perhaps V might not be the only one.

 

* * *

 

Finally, the gallery opened up into a small cave with a glass-clear lake in its centre. The lake was very shallow and it had a white gravel bottom. An island rose from the centre of the lake, and on the island stood a building constructed in the same, curiously pyramidal shape as the buildings in the ruined city of Diophe far above. The ziggurat was surrounded by a ring of columns, and here and there were benches carved from white stone. Glowing crystal globes were suspended on long chains from the ceiling of the cavern about thirty feet overhead, and their light, while still faint, was noticeably brighter than that in the galleries through which they had passed. A white marble causeway crossed to the island, and a very wizened man stood at its end, peering across the still water toward them as they entered the cavern.

“Sella ma, da taang, Gregarion.” the old man called. “Horm a DIO.”

“Phenom,” Greg replied with a formal bow. “Sellama, hor ma DIO.” He led the little band across the causeway to the island and warmly clasped the old man’s hand, speaking to him in that same alien Phenaidian language.

The Phenom of the Phenaidians appeared to be _very_ old. He (or was it a she? He assumed the former because he--) had a long, silvery hair and beard, and his robe was snowy white. There was a kind of saintly serenity about them that Steven felt immediately, and the boy knew, without knowing how he knew, that he was definitely approaching a holy figure-- perhaps the holiest on earth.

The Phenom extended their arms warmly to Aunt Pearl, and she embraced them wholeheartedly, affectionately even, as they exchanged the ritual greeting. “Sella ma, horm a DIO.”

“Our companions do not speak the language, old friend.” Greg said to the Phenom. “Would it offend if you if we spoke the Common tongue?”

“Not at all, Gregarion.” the Phenom replied. “DIO tells us that it’s important for us peoples to understand one another. Come inside, all of you. I’ve had food and drink prepared for you.” As the old one looked at each of them, Steven noticed that their eyes, unlike those of the other Phenai, were a deep, almost violet green. Then the Phenom turned and led them along a path to the doorway of the ziggurat.

“Has the child come yet?” Greg asked the Phenom as they passed through the massive stone doorway.

The Phenom sighed. “No, Greg, not yet, and I am very weary. There’s hope at each birth, but after a few days, the eyes of the child darken. It appears DIO is not finished with me yet.” He said in a heavy voice.

“Don’t be discouraged, Phenom,” Greg told his friend. “The child will come, in DIO’s own time.”

“So we are told,” they said, sighing again. “The tribes are growing restless, Greg. There’s bickering-and worse-- in some of the farther galleries, the zealots grow bolder in their denunciations, and strange aberrations and cults have begun to appear…. Or so my robonoids tell me.”

They turn to look Greg directly in the eye before speaking again, in a deathly whisper. “Phenaidia **_needs_ ** a new Phenom, Greg. I want to die. I _must_ .” they said with a pained expression. “I’ve felt the call for three hundred years now. That’s how long I’ve outlived my station. _Three hundred years._ ”

“DIO still has work for you,” Greg replied sympathetically. “His ways are not ours, Phenom, and he sees time in a different way.”

The room they had entered was square, but had, nonetheless, the slightly sloping walls characteristic of Phenai architecture. A stone table with low benches on either side sat in the centre of the room, and there were a number of bowls containing fruit sitting upon it. Among the bowls were several tall flasks and round crystal cups. “I’m told winter has come early to our mountains,” the Phenom said to them. “The drink should help to warm you.”

“It _has_ been chilly outside,” Greg admitted.

 ------

They sat down on the benches and began to eat. The fruit was tangy and wild-tasting, and the clear liquid in the flasks was fiery, and though the extent of it’s flame was in appearance only, it still brought about an immediate warm glowing feeling that radiated out from the stomach.

“Forgive us our customs, which may seem strange to you,” the Phenom said, noting that Amethyst and Jasper in particular approached the meal of fruit with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. “We are a people much tied to ceremony. It’s true that we require no food, but for this fruit which we continue to eat in remembrance of the years we spent wandering in search of DIO. The meat will come in due time.”

“Where do you obtain such food in these caves, Holy One?” Vidalia asked politely.

“Our gatherers go out of the caves at night," the Phenom replied. "They tell us that the fruits and grains they bring back with them grow wild in the mountains, but I suspect that they have long since taken up the cultivation of certain fertile valleys. They also maintain that the meat they carry down to us is the flesh of wild cattle, taken in the hunt, but I have my doubts about that as well." They smiled gently. "I permit them their little deceptions."

Perhaps emboldened by the Phenom’s geniality, Bismuth raised a question that had obviously been bothering him since he had entered the city on the mountaintop above. "Forgive me, uh, your Grace," he began, "but why do your builders make everything crooked? What I mean is, nothing seems to be square. It all leans over."

"It has to do with weight and support; I understand," the Phenom replied. "Each wall is actually falling down; but since they're all falling against each other, none of them can move so much as a finger's width - and, of course, their shape reminds us of the tents we lived in during our wanderings."

Bismuth frowned thoughtfully, struggling with the alien idea.

"And have you as yet recovered Grey Diamond’s Ward, Gregarion?" the Phenom inquired then, their face growing serious.

"Not yet," Greg replied. "We chased Andy as far as Olivia, but when he crossed over into Sivu Isyak, Aquamarine was waiting and took the Orb away from him. Aquamarine has it now - at Fy Sivu."

"And Andy?"

"He escaped Aqua’s ambush and carried Black Diamond off to Noxu-Isyak in Mania to keep Aquamarine from raising him with the Ward."

"Then you'll have to go to Fy Sivu."

Gregarion nodded as a Phenai serving gem brought in a huge, steaming roast, set it on the table, and left with a respectful bow.

"Has anyone found out how Andarion was able to take the Ward without being struck down?" the Phenom asked

"He used a **_child,_ **" Aunt Pearl told him. "An innocent youth."

"Ah." The Phenom stroked their beard thoughtfully. "Doesn't the prophecy say, 'And the child shall deliver up the birthright unto the Chosen One'?"

"Yes," Greg replied.

"Where's the child now?"

"So far as we know, Aquamarine has him at Fy Sivu."

"Will you assault Fy Sivu, then?"

"I'd need an army, and it could take years to reduce that fortress. There's another way, I think. A certain passage in the Topazine Codex speaks of caves under Fy Sivu."

"I know that passage, Greg. It's _very_ obscure. It could mean that, I suppose, but what if it doesn't?"

"It's confirmed by the Marin Codex," Gregarion said a little defensively.

"The Marin Codex is even **_worse_ **, old friend. It's obscure to the point of being gibberish."

“That may well be true, but I have the nagging suspicion that when we look back at it -- after all this is over -- we’re going to find that the Marin Codex is the most accurate version of all. I do have certain, other verification, however. Back during the time when the Isyaki were constructing Fy Sivu, a single Rutile gem, enslaved by them and forced to work on the fortress, escaped and made her way back to us. Her gem was cracked beyond repair. She was delirious when we found her, but she kept talking of caves underneath the mountain before she shattered. Not only that, but Thur-Man found a copy of the Black Book that contains a fragment of a very old Marek prophecy - ‘Guard well the temple, above and beneath, for The Corrupted Ward will summon foes down from the sky or up from the earth itself to bear it away again.’”

“You’re going to use _that_ as evidence of caves?” the Phenom said incredulously. “I’m surprised your little band made it this far at all!”

“You’re not the only one.” murmured V dryly.

“All Marikeen prophecies are, but it’s all I’ve got to work with. If I reject the possibility of caves underneath that stone fortress, I’ll have to lay siege to the place. It would take all the armies of the West to do that, and then Aquamarine would summon the Alabastian armies to defend the city. Everything points to some final battle, it’s true, but I’d prefer to pick the time and place-- The Wasteland of Isyak is definitely **_not_ **one of the places I’d choose.”

“I suspect you’re going somewhere with this, Greg.”

Gregarion nodded. “I need one of your metalbenders to help me find the caves beneath Fy Sivu and lead me up through them to the city. And not just any metalbender. I need a Ferrokinetic.”

The Phenom shook their head. “You’re asking the impossible, Greg. The Ferrokinetics are all zealot-mystics. You’ll never persuade any of them to leave the holy caves of Diophe - particularly not now. All of Phenai is waiting for the coming of the child, and every zealot is firmly convinced that they will be the one to discover the child and reveal them to the tribes. I cou;dn’t even order one of them to accompany you. In a holy city, the ferrokinetics are regarded as even holier gems, and despite me, I have no authority over them.”

“It may not be as hard as you think, Phenom.” Gregarion pushed back his plate and reached for his cup. “The ferrokinetic I need is one named Peridot.”

“Peridot? She’s the worst of the lot. She’s gathered a following and she preaches to them by the hour in some of the far galleries. She believes that she’s the most important gem in Phenai by now. You’ll never persuade her to leave these caves.”

“I don’t think I’ll have to, Phenom. I’m not the one who chose Peridot for this. That decision was made _loooooong_ before I was born. Just send for her.”

“Oh, I’ll send for her all right,” the Phenom said doubtfully. “I don’t think she’ll come though.”

“She’ll come,” Aunt Pearl told them confidently. “She won’t know why, but she’ll come. And she will go with us, Phenom. That same power that brought us all together will bring her as well. She doesn’t have any more choice in the matter than we do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Helloooooooooooooooooooooooooooo everyone! I'm finally working on this again.
> 
> T'was a long hiatus, tis true, but I needed to get my thoughts in order. Well, that and... I needed some motivation, which, thanks to a certain special someone, (and he's looking over my shoulder as I'm writing this =_=), will be ensuring a regular update schedule from me from now on :)
> 
> I've missed all of you so very much. I can't wait to finally start writing about everything again cx


	19. Crystal Chorus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dark days loom ahead for the Fellowship. And unfortunately for them, their newest member will not go so gentle into that good night.

**IT ALL SEEMED** so unbearably tedious. First the snow and the cold, and now the warm, dank darkness. It had numbed Connie, and the warmth here in the caverns made her drowsy. The endless, obscure talk of Mister Wolf--uh, Gregarion? And that strange, frail old Phenom seemed to pull her only more firmly towards sleep. The peculiar singing began again somewhere, echoing endlessly through the caves, and that too only served to lull her. Only a lifetime of training in the involved etiquette of court behaviour kept her awake.

 

And believe her, the journey had been simply **_ghastly_ **for Connie. Tol Maheshwar was a warm city, and she was not accustomed to the cold at all. She was almost positive that her feet would never be warm again. She had also discovered a world filled with shocks, terrors and unpleasant surprises. At the Imperial Palace in Tol Maheshwar, the absolute power of her father, Emperor Doug, had shielded her from danger of any kind, but now she felt vulnerable. In a rare moment of naked, stark truth with herself, she admitted that much of her spiteful behaviour towards Steven had grown out of her dreadful new sense of insecurity. Her safe pampered little world had been snatched away from her, and she felt exposed, unprotected and afraid.

 

Alas, poor Steven, she thought. He really was such a good guy. She felt just a little ashamed that _he_ had to be the one who’d had to bear the brunt of her temper. She promised herself that soon -- very soon -- she would sit down with him and explain it all. Yes! That’s what she’d do. He was a sensible boy, after all, and he’d surely understand. She’d just, talk it out with him, and that should immediately patch up the rift which had grown between them.

 

As she’d let her train of thought play out, she had unwittingly been staring at him the entire time. Feeling her eyes on her, he glanced once in her direction, before looking away with apparent indifference. Connie’s eyes hardened like agates. _How dared he?_ She made a mental note of it and added it to her list of his many imperfections.

 

The frail-looking old Phenom had sent one of the strange, silent Phenaidians to fetch the gem they and Greg and Lady Pearl had been discussing, and then they turned to more general topics.

 

“Were you able to pass through the mountains unmolested?” the Phenom asked.

 

“We’ve had a couple minor incidents on the way here,” Amethyst, the big lush-chested, Earl of Crenellan, replied with what seemed to Connie a gross understatement.

“But thanks to DIO, you’re all safe!” the Phenom declared piously. “Which of the monsters are still abroad at this season? I haven’t been out of these caves in years, but as I recall most of them seek their lairs at first snow.”

 

“We encountered Dreadsteeds, Holy One.” Ruby spoke up. “And some Gem Mutants. And then there was one Corrupted Gem.”

 

“That one gave us a run for our money,” V commented dryly.

 

“Oh dear. How troubling. Fortunately, there aren’t many Corrupted Gems roaming these parts. They’re such fearsome creatures. To turn into one…” the Phenom shuddered. “I can only imagine.”

 

“Nothing less than a tragedy, Holy One.” Jasper offered.

 

“Which one was she?”

 

“Biggs,” Greg replied. “She and I have history, and she seemed to hold a grudge. I’m sorry Phenom, but we had to shatter her. There was no other way.”

 

“Ah,” the Phenom said with a slight note of pain in their voice. “Poor Biggs.”

 

“I personally don’t miss her very much.” Amy quipped, before hastily adding-- “Uh, no offense, Holy Phenom, but don’t you think these mountains would be… I don’t know-- safer? With these monsters gone?”

 

“They’re the children of DIO, even as are we. Though corruption cannot be undone by any one Diamond, at least here, within the land where His presence lingers, their pain can be lessened.” the Phenom explained.

 

“But if they weren’t out there, you could return to the world above,” Amy pointed out. “Don’t you think it’d be a good idea to-- I dunno --exterminate some of the more troublesome ones?”

 

“Lord Amethyst,” the Phenom regarded her kindly, but directly. “They were your sisters too.”

 

They didn’t say it with any sort of steel in their voice, but it had a penetrating quality nonetheless. Enough to make even the normally boisterous Amethyst pause in quiet pensiveness.

 

The Phenom smiled at that. “No,” they said gently. “Phenaidia will never leave these caves now. We’ve dwelt here for five millennia and, over the years, we’ve changed. Our eyes cannot bear the sunlight, and our gems have adapted to the light here as well. The monsters above cannot reach us here, and their presence keeps strangers out of Phenai. We don’t do well with strangers, really, so it’s probably for the best.”

 

The Phenom was sitting directly across the narrow stone table from Connie. The subject of the monsters obviously pained them, and they looked at her for a moment, then gently reached out their frail old hand and lifted the tip of her little chin in it, turning her face to the dim light of the hanging globe suspended above the table. “All of the alien creatures are not monsters,” they said, their large, violet eyes calm and appraising. “Consider the beauty of this Dryad.”

 

Connie was a little startled -- not by their touch, certainly, for older people had responded to her flower-like face with that same gesture for as long as she could remember, but rather, by the ancient one’s immediate recognition of the fact that she was not entirely human.

 

“Tell me, child,” the Phenom asked. “Do the Dryads still honour their patron Diamond?”

 

She was completely unprepared for the question. “I--I’m sorry, Holy One,” she floundered. “Until quite recently, I hadn’t even heard of the God DIO. For some reason, my tutors hace very little information about your people or your God.”

 

“The princess was raised as a Shwarean,” Aunt Pearl explained. “She’s a Maheshwaran - I’m sure you’ve heard of the link between that house and the Dryads. As a Shwarean, her religious affiliation is to Orange Diamond.”

 

“A serviceable one, Orange,” the Phenom mused. “Perhaps a bit stuffy for my taste, but certainly adequate. The Dryads themselves, though, - do they still know their God?”

 

Gregarion coughed apologetically. “I’m afraid not, Phenom. They’ve drifted away, and the eons have erased what they know of DIO. They’re flighty creatures anyway, not much for religious observances.”

 

The Phenom’s face was sad. “Do they even have a Diamond they honour now?”

 

“I’m afraid not,” Greg admitted. “They have… several sacred groves, I think, a rough idol or two fashioned from the stone of a particularly venerated crystalline tree. That’s about it. They don’t really have any clearly formulated theology.”

 

Connie found the whole discussion a trifle offensive. Rising to the occasion, she drew herself up slightly and smiled winsomely at the old Phenom. She knew exactly how to charm an elderly man. She’d practiced for years on her father. “I feel the shortcomings of my education most keenly, Holy One,” she lied. “Since mysterious DIO is the patron Diamond of the Dryads, I should know him. I hope that someday soon, I may receive instruction concerning him. It may be that I - unworthy though I may be - can be the instrument of renewing the allegiance of my sisters and mother to their rightful God.”

 

It was an artful little speech, truly, and Connie was very proud of it. Alas, the Phenom was not satisfied to accept a vague expression of interest and let it go at that. “Tell your sisters that the core of our faith is to be found in the Book of the Phenai,” they told her seriously.

 

“The Book of Phenai…,” she repeated. “I must remember that. As soon as I return to Tol Maheshwar, I’ll obtain a copy and deliver it personally to the Wood of the Dryads.” That, she thought, should satisfy him.

 

“I’m afraid that such copies as you’d find in Tol Maheshwar would be much corrupted,” the Phenom told her. “The tongue of my people is not easily understood by strangers, and translations are difficult.”

 

Connie definitely felt that the dear old man was becoming just a little tiresome about the whole thing.

 

“As is so often the case with scripture,” they were saying, “our Holy Book is bound up in our history. The wisdom of the Diamonds, all of them, is such that their teachings are concealed within stories. Our minds delight in the stories, and the messages of the Diamonds are implanted thus. All unaware, we are instructed even as we are entertained.”

 

Connie was familiar with the theory. Master Jarvis, her tutor, had lectured her tediously concerning it. She cast about rather desperately, trying to find some graceful way to change the subject.

 

“Our story is very old,” the Phenom continued. Though as they did, she thought she caught the slight hint of a smile curling their mouth. “Would you like to hear it?”

 

Caught by her own design, Connie could only nod helplessly. And so the Phenom began. “At the Beginning of Days, when the world was yet nascent, woven from fine threads of light out of eternal darkness by the wayward Diamonds, there dwelt in the silences of the heavens, an eldritch spirit known only as DIO.”

 

In utter dismay, Connie realised that they fully intended to recite the _entire_ book to her. After a few moments of chagrin, however, she began to feel the strangely compelling quality of their story. More than she would have cared to admit, she was moved by the Phenom’s appeal to the indifferent spirit that appeared to him at Diophe. She couldn’t help but wonder, what manner of man would be so bold? To accuse a God?

 

As she listened, a faint flicker seemed to tug at the corner of her eye. She glanced towards it and saw a soft, greenish glow from somewhere deep within the massive rocks that formed one of the walls of the chamber. This glow was particularly different from the dim light of the hanging crystal globes.

 

“Then the heart of the Phenom was made glad,” the old one continued their recitation, “and he called the name of the high place where all this had come to pass ‘DIO-Phe’, which means Holy Place. And he departed from Diophe therefore, and returned unto-”

 

“Hoi! Tahk-gok aku, Phenom!” The words were spat in particularly harsh Phenaidian, in a voice filled with outrage.

 

Connie jerked her head around to look at the intruder. Phenaidians were short, true, but this one was truly a dwarf. Miniscule even. She threw back her hood, then, and the source of the light was revealed. The little Phenaidian’s glowing gem, like the colour of her skin, was curiously green, save for her yellow hair, which, far from being tangled and unkempt like the rest of her entourage, was kept in a sharp, angular pyramidal shape. So neatly did it sit that it almost looked like a helmet, or a crown of sorts, detachable at a moment’s notice.

 

Indeed, her plain smock and visor was the only thing about her which said anything of her station, stained and smeared as it was, and even then, it did little to hide the errant fires of fanaticism that burned within her chartreuse yellow eyes. Her entourage numbered a dozen strong, and each had their faces set in expressions of shock and righteous indignation. The tiny fanatic continued her tirade of crackling vituperation.

 

The Phenom’s face was inscrutable, but they endured the abuse from the wild-eyed gem at the door all the same. Finally, _finally_ when the fanatic paused for breath, the frail old one turned to Greg. “This is Peridot,” they said rather apologetically. “You see what I mean about her? Trying to convince her of anything is nothing less than impossible.”

 

“How’s _she_ gonna help us with _anything?_ ” Amethyst demanded, obviously prickled by the newcomer’s attitude. “She can’t even speak normal.”

 

Peridot glared at her. “I speak your language, you pebble,” she said with towering contempt, “but I choose **_not_ ** to defile these sacred caverns with its unsanctified, disgusting utterances.” She turned back toward the Phenom. “And you! Who gave _you_ the right to speak the words of the utmost, _hoooliest_ book in all of Phenai, to these unbelieving **_aliens_ **?”

 

The gentle old Phenom’s eyes took on a hint of steel. “I think that’s about enough, Peridot.” they said firmly. “Whatever idiocies you babble in out-of-the-way galleries to those gullible fools you call followers is your concern. But you’re in _my_ house now. **I** am still Phenom in Phenaidia, and contrary to what you think, and I am **not** required to answer to you.” They looked past Peridot at the shocked faces of the zealot’s followers. “This is not a rally. _You_ were summoned here. _They_ were not. Send them away.”

 

“They came to ensure that I, your honest and truthful Peridot, would not come to any harm,” Peridot replied stiffly. “For that is exactly what I have done. I speak truths, and powerful gems fear the truth.”

 

“Peridot,” the Phenom said in a voice like ice. “I don’t think you could even begin to understand how indifferent I am to anything you might have said about me. I’ll say this one more time. Send them away-- or I will.”

 

“They won’t listen to you,” Peridot sneered confidently. “ **_I_ ** am their leader.”

 

The Phenom’s eyes narrowed, and they rose to their feet. Then they spoke in the Phenai tongue directly to Peridot’s adherents. Connie could not understand their words, but then again, she didn’t really need to. What she _did_ recognise though, almost instantly, was that tone of authority, and she was startled at how absolutely the saintly old Phenom used it. Not even her father would have dared to speak in that tone.

 

The gems crowded behind Peridot looked nervously at each other and began to back away, frightened. The Phenom utter one final, dreadful command, and that broke them. Peridot’s followers turned and fled.

 

Peridot scowled after them and seemed for a moment to consider raising her voice to call them back, but suddenly thought better of it. “You go too far, Phenom,” she accused, though her voice was softer now. “You’re not supposed to use that authority in mortal matters.”

 

“That authority is mine, Peridot.” the Phenom replied. “And it’s up to me to decide when it’s required. You’ve chosen to confront me on theological ground, Peridot, therefore I had to remind your followers-- and you, even, just who I am.”

“Why have you summoned me here?” Peridot demanded. “The mere presence of these… these unsanctified _clods_ is an affront to my purity.”

 

“I require your service, Peridot,” the Phenom told her. “These strangers go to battle against our Ancient Foe, the one accursed above all others. The fate of the world hangs in the balance, and your aid is needed.”

 

“Pffft, what do _I_ care about the world?” Peridot’s voice was filled with contempt. “And what do I care about Black Diamond? I am safe within the hand of the Immortal, the Illustrious, DIO. **He** has need of me here, and I’d sooner be shattered than to defy His will and go forth from the holy caverns and risk being defiled in the lewd company of unbelievers and monsters.”

 

“The entire world will be defiled if Black gains dominion over it,” Greg pointed out. “And if we fail, Black Diamond will become Queen over all the world.”

 

“She won’t reign in Phenai,” Peridot retorted.

 

“How little you know of her,” Pearl murmured.

 

“My decision is **final,** ” Peridot insisted. “I will not leave these caves. The coming of the chosen child is at hand, and **_I_ **have been chosen to reveal her to Phenai and to guide and instruct her until she is ready to become the new Phenom.”

 

“How interesting,” the Phenom observed blandly. “Just _who_ was it who advised you of your election?”

 

“DIO himself.” Peridot declared proudly.

 

“That’s odd. These caverns respond universally to the voice of DIO. All of Phenai would have heard him say that.”

 

“He spoke to me in my heart,” she quickly replied.

 

“Oh? What a curious thing for him to do,” the Phenom answered mildly.

 

“All of this is beside the point,” Greg cut them off. “Peridot, I would truly prefer you join us willingly, but willing or not, you **_will_ **join us. A power greater than any of us commands it. You can argue, and you can resist if you want to, but when we leave this place, we’ll be leaving with you.”

 

Throughout his entire proclamation, Peridot’s eyes grew wider and wider, until finally she was almost livid. “Never!” she spat. “I will remain here in the service of DIO and of the child who will become Phenom of Phenai! And if you try to compel me, to force me, my loyal followers will stop you. And I promise you that **that** won’t end well for you.”

 

“Greg, this is _pointless._ Why the heck do we even need little Peri-snot for?” Amethyst asked, exasperatedly. “She’s only gonna irritate all of us. I should know better than anyone that people who spend all their time congratulating themselves about how pious they are tend to be piss-poor traveling companions.”

 

Peridot looked at the purple-haired giant with disdain. “ _I’m_ the little one? Somebody’s overcompensating, don’t you think?” she quipped, before walking over to the sloping wall of the chamber. “Observe, you clods. Can any of you do _this?_ ” she asked as she slowly pushed her hand directly into the rock as though she were sinking it into water.

 

Vidalia whistled with amazement and moved quickly over to the wall beside the zealot. As Peridot withdrew her hand from the rock, there flowed between her fingers a silvery white substance. Vidalia reached out to put her own hand on that precise spot. “How did you do that?” she demanded, pushing at the stones. “Is that a gem thing?” she continued, glancing at Amethyst. She only shrugged.

 

Peridot laughed shrilly as she turned her back.

 

“That’s the reason we need her, Vidalia.” Greg explained. “Peridot’s a ferrokinetic. She’s a cave-finder, and we need to locate those caves under Fy Sivu if we’re gonna make this work. If necessary, Peridot can walk through solid rock _and_ metal to find it for us.”

 

“How could anyone do that?” Vidalia asked, still staring at the spot where Peridot had sunk her hand into the wall.

 

“It’s got something to do with the nature of solid matter,” the sorcerer replied. “What we see as solid is actually made up of..uh… well what matters is, it’s not all solid.”

 

“Well that doesn’t make any sense. Either something’s solid or it’s not.” V insisted, her face baffled.

 

“Solidity is an illusion,” Aunt Pearl chimed in. “What Peridot can do is slip herself between the bits and pieces that make up the whole substance.”

 

That left the rest of them scratching their heads.

 

“Well… Could _you_ do it?” Vidalia demanded skeptically.

 

Greg shrugged. “I don’t know. Never had the occasion or the need to try. Anyway, Peridot can’t just walk through rock. She’s connected to the earth itself in a way the rest of us aren’t. She can see caves, and she goes straight to them. She probably isn’t even aware of how she does it.”

 

“I am the great and powerful Peridot, and that’s all the reason you need.” Peridot declared arrogantly.

 

“Of course,” the sorcerer agreed with a tolerant smile.

 

“I am also led by my proximity to His Divinity. As His most loyal servant, I will never leave His side nor ignore His commandments,” Peridot rasped on, “for me to do so would be akin to heresy, and so you see, I can never defy his will and move towards such defilement.”

 

“Well, you may well be right. Though I suppose we’ll have to get the real story from Him.” Greg replied.

 

The glow in the rock wall which Connie had noticed earlier had begun to shimmer and to pulsate, and the princess seemed to see a dim shape emerge from within the rocks. Then, as if the stones were only air, the shape became distinct and stepped out into the chamber. For a moment, just a moment, it seemed that the figure was nothing more than an old man, bearded and robed like the Phenom, although somehow, much more robust.

 

Then Connie was once again struck by an overpowering sense of superhuman aura. With an awed shudder, and for the second time in as many tendays, she realised she was in the presence of divinity.

 

Peridot gaped at the bearded figure, and she began to tremble violently. With a strangled cry, she prostrated herself.

 

The figure looked calmly on at the groveling gem. “Rise, Peridot,” He said in a soft voice, that seemed to echo on into eternity, reverberating into the caverns endlessly. “Rise, Peridot, and serve thy God.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys. So someone flew back to Germany last night, and I miss him already. In case you were wondering where I’ve been of course :)
> 
> He fell in love with my stories, and he made me promise to write him one, and that’s an extra commitment that, if I’m being honest, I care far more about.
> 
> For what it’s worth, I’m sorry I have to do it at the expense of this fic, because there’s nothing I love more than worldbuilding. Steven Universe has been an endless source of inspiration, and it continues to be my favourite show. So I’ll always return to this from time to time. Fret not, my darlings. I’ll be in touch <3


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